Apologeticae sive Theologiae Fundamentalis, Tomus I: Demonstratio Christiana

Some moderns admit that marvelous works exist which cannot be explained by the physical forces of nature. They maintain, however, that these are not to be attributed to a divine cause, but either to the psychical efficacy of human beings, or to the psychical efficacy of human beings aided, as they say, by the spirits of the higher world, or finally, simply, to the efficacy of diabolical spirits.

The first are called hypnotic wonders, the second spiritistic wonders, the third diabolical wonders. The question therefore arises whether true miracles can be explained away by these counterfeits of miracles.

1. Hypnotic wonders.¹ Hypnosis is so called from the Greek word ὕπνος = sleep, because it is a morbid state similar to natural sleep.

Already known among the ancient Medes, Chaldaeans, Indians, Egyptians, and Greeks, and in recent times recognized by the physicians Mesmer († 1815) and Braid († 1860), hypnosis was scientifically investigated on all sides in the last decades of the nineteenth century.

In practice physicians use hypnosis to cure various diseases; artists, to obtain models (Modelle, modèles) which will long preserve the same posture; judges, to extort confessions from the accused or from witnesses; parents and teachers, to root out bad habits in children; conjurers, to prey upon curious and superstitious people; corruptors, to attain base ends. The scientific theory of hypnosis, as well as the practical art of inducing it, is called hypnotism, sometimes also mesmerism or braidism.

It is the part of physicians to expound hypnosis from the medical point of view, of moralists to judge it from ethics, of apologists, however, only to prove that hypnosis has nothing to do with miracles. For this reason the hypnotic phenomena are first to be enumerated, then to be explained.

a) The hypnotic phenomena are enumerated. Hypnosis is of twofold origin: spontaneous and artificial. Spontaneous hypnosis occurs without being intended either by the hypnotized person or by the hypnotizer. It suddenly overcomes persons disposed to it by nature or by chance (hysterics, the severely wounded, etc.). Artificial hypnosis is produced voluntarily by the person either to be hypnotized or hypnotizing. The means of provoking and intensifying artificial hypnosis are either sensorial (by exciting or soothing the senses, e. g. the eyes with a bright object, the ears with an unfamiliar noise), or mechanical (by percussion or pressure on the body, the head, the eyes), or physical (by the force of the magnet, of electricity), or narcotic (by ether, chloroform, morphine, alcohol), but chiefly psychical, namely by suggestion, whether one's own (autosuggestion) or another's (heterosuggestion).

The hypnotic state, however arising and however induced, shines forth in four phenomena: lethargy, catalepsy, somnambulism, and suggestibility.²

It must nevertheless be noted that not all these phenomena are present in every single case of hypnosis. Sometimes only lethargy, or catalepsy, or hypnotic somnambulism is present; sometimes lethargy occurs first, then catalepsy, finally somnambulism. Suggestibility, however, never fails, whether the other phenomena are present or absent.

1°. Hypnosis usually begins with lethargy. It manifests itself in the extreme irritability and contraction of the muscles, as well as in a more or less perfect anaesthesia (insensibility) of the senses and of the whole surface of the body. Whence it comes about that the lethargic person communicates with the outer world scarcely or not at all, and even the power of the suggester himself is with difficulty brought to bear upon him.

2°. Catalepsy usually follows lethargy, although it can occur or be provoked without it. In catalepsy the anaesthesia of the senses is absolutely perfect, so much so that the hypnotized person can be pricked, cut, and burned without pain. There is added the properly cataleptic mark, namely the rigor of the muscles, whereby it comes about that the patient, like a corpse, lacks all "spontaneous" movement. Since the muscles do not react at all to irritations, the limbs have an entirely waxen flexibility, so that they can be moved and fixed in any position whatever and invariably retain the movement or posture once received. Through impressed movements catalepsy also receives suitable phantasms and, accordingly, suggestions.

3°. Somnambulism is distinguished from lethargy and catalepsy by this, that it not only relaxes the sensitive faculties but wonderfully increases them. And first of all the external senses. Sight is sharpened in a wonderful way, so that the somnambulist can read with ease the smallest letter-forms with almost closed eyes, nay, can clearly see things whose tiniest image is reflected from the eyes of another person. Hearing reacts to the lightest sounds and even perceives noises at a great distance. In like manner taste, touch, and smell are sharpened. But also the internal senses. The phantasy is so far exalted that it receives images of things as vivid as if the objects themselves were present. The memory is so firm and tenacious that the somnambulist recognizes most perfectly whatever he once learned or perceived, e. g. languages which he had known cursorily in youth or had heard by chance. The instinct emerges with such force that the ailing somnambulist often indicates his own illness and its remedies, led by natural sense after the manner of animals. The spiritual faculties, on the contrary, lie dormant. The intellect is elevated only accidentally, because the sensitive life is more faithfully assisted, e. g. a somnambulist pupil will sometimes do a difficult assignment more easily, because the somnambulic memory holds the teacher's lesson more firmly. Of the exercise and force of the will there is almost nothing. Self-consciousness the somnambulist has wholly lost.

4°. Suggestibility, taken in general, is the propensity to undergo suggestions.³ By hypnotic suggestibility is understood that by which various representations, affections, motions, and actions can be commanded to the hypnotized person ("medium") at the nod of the suggester. Suggestibility is minimal in lethargy, greater in catalepsy, greatest in somnambulism. The somnambulist suffers and performs everything whatever is suggested to him. Is it suggested to him that he is a little schoolboy? Suddenly he will put on the manners and ignorance of a beginner, although he be an old man and a teacher. Is it suggested to him that he is another person, or several persons, or even a beast? He is inwardly convinced that the matter is so. Is it suggested to him that the water held out is generous wine? He believes he is drinking generous wine, and becomes drunk. Is blindness or deafness suggested to him? He immediately becomes blind or deaf. Is it suggested, on the contrary, that he is freed from the hysterical blindness or deafness with which he was afflicted before the hypnosis? He is suddenly cured, and will remain cured even after the hypnosis. Is it suggested to him that in the posthypnotic state he will commit a crime or lay aside a bad habit? Infallibly, at the appointed time that had been suggested to him, he will carry it out, although perhaps the suggester no longer remembers the "medium". This posthypnotic propensity fades away only gradually, sooner or later, according to the degree of suggestibility or of the suggestion.

b) The hypnotic phenomena are explained. The hypnotic phenomena, and hence hypnosis itself, have sometimes been attributed to preternatural causes. Unjustly, however. For although it is sometimes difficult to know what natural cause produced some particular hypnotic effect, nevertheless it is certain that all hypnotic phenomena are produced by natural causes. For these phenomena occur also outside hypnosis in those conditions in which preternatural causality is evidently excluded. And indeed:

1°. Imperfect lethargy is present in natural sleep, the most perfect in apparent death ("stupor"), the perfect one in that state of the chronic disease with which hypnotic lethargy wholly shares both name and nature.

2°. Phenomena of catalepsy are observed in all hospitals and insane asylums, especially among melancholics, paralytics, and hysterics. From this prehypnotic catalepsy the hypnotic catalepsy differs scarcely or not at all.

3°. Imperfect somnambulism afflicts those men who walk in their sleep (whence it is also called somnambulism) and perform many unusual things; perfect somnambulism frequently invades singular persons and even whole infirmaries, whole families or schools, after the manner of an epidemic. To these infirm persons hypnotic somnambulists are wholly equal, not only physiologically but also psychically.

Unjustly are preternatural psychical powers and actions attributed to hypnotic somnambulists. Their so-called "clear vision" (Hellsehen, clairvoyance) rests upon the incredible acuteness of the senses, the phantasy, the memory, and the instinct. The stories that are told of the speaking of wholly unknown languages, of the prediction of future contingent events, of action at a distance, or of other wonders of this kind in somnambulists, are either mere fables or at least are not established.

4°. Psychical suggestibility, or "impressionability", is in all men. Even in the state of waking and in daily life we are frequently subjected to suggestion, e. g. the sight of troublesome little animals excites itching; the representation of foul things provokes vomiting, etc. The weaker the will and self-consciousness, the greater the suggestibility. Whence in natural sleep, and especially in natural somnambulism, certain men are capable of stupendous suggestion, because, while the will and consciousness sleep, their external and internal senses are sometimes wonderfully exalted.

Since this is so, we no longer wonder that in artificial or hypnotic sleep, and above all in hypnotic somnambulism, suggestibility is at its maximum. For on the one hand the "medium" suffers hyperaesthesia (extreme sensibility) of the senses and nerves, on the other hand he is without the exercise of will and self-consciousness, and accordingly depends almost wholly on the nod and influence of the suggester.

On this suggestive influence hypnotic therapy also rests and terminates, i. e. the cure of diseases effected through hypnotism. By hypnotic — nay, even prehypnotic — suggestion are removed those diseases whose sole cause is suggestion (namely, certain "functional" disturbances of the senses, of respiration, of digestion, of palpitation,⁴ of the whole nervous system), and which are called hysterical or nervous.

For just as those hysterico-nervous diseases arise from suggestion, so too they can naturally be cured through suggestion. Beyond this, however, psychotherapy does not extend. True or "organic" diseases wholly elude the efficacy of hypnotic psychotherapy no less than of prehypnotic. Psychical suggestion gives only a transient illusion of the cure, or rather of the mitigation, of true diseases. It therefore acts wholly according to the laws, not beyond the laws, of nature. Consequently it contains nothing miraculous.

2. Spiritistic wonders.⁵ Spiritism or spiritualism is so called because it boasts of commerce with the spirits of the other world, namely with angels and the souls of deceased men. It is also called mediumism, because that commerce usually takes place through persons singularly fitted for it; hypno-spiritism, because spiritistic mediums frequently act in the hypnotic state; occultism, because it shuns the light of day; theosophy, because spiritism has constructed a religious system sui generis out of superstitious supernaturalism and unbelieving naturalism.

Already the Old Testament abhors those who, after the manner of the heathen, "consult soothsayers" or "seek the truth from the dead".⁶ In fact almost all ancient peoples — above all the Hebrews, Chaldaeans, Egyptians, Indians, Chinese, Greeks, Romans, Celts — favored spiritistic magic, oracles, and divinations. In the Middle Ages Jewish cabbalists as well as certain Christian magicians cultivated spiritistic arts (the conjuring of demons, necromancy, etc.), against the resistance of the ecclesiastical magisterium. When at length hypnotism was revived in the nineteenth century, spiritism first gained ground in America, afterwards in the various regions of Europe, so that around the year 1880 almost 20 million adherents of the "religion" of spiritism were numbered. When at last the frauds of many mediums were detected and the absurdities of spiritistic doctrine laid bare, this deadly plague declined day by day, although even today many hundreds of thousands adhere to it.⁷

It is the part of moral theology to show that theoretical and practical spiritism is illicit; of apologetics, however, that spiritistic phenomena are not to be equated with miracles. To this end we shall first enumerate those phenomena, afterwards judge them.

a) The spiritistic phenomena are enumerated. In spiritistic séances phenomena of three kinds occur:

1°. Local motions with no mechanical force applied. The most frequently reported is the turning of tables. It is brought about in this way: several persons — one alone very rarely suffices — touch with their fingertips a table at which they sit around. After a short interval the table begins to move and to be shaken by its feet. Sometimes tables, chairs, and other furniture, nay, even the spiritistic "mediums" themselves, are lifted into the air, bells are set ringing, musical sounds are heard, and the room resounds with noises and unusual blows.

2°. Intellectual revelations. When questions are put, answers are obtained bearing both upon earthly and upon heavenly matters, e. g. scientific or religious questions are elucidated; the state of the departed in the other life is set forth. Now the things that are revealed are not in themselves miraculous; for those revelations mostly contain puerile, facetious, and fabricated matter, and never exceed the knowledge which either the "mediums" or the other persons present at the séance possess.⁸ Yet the manner in which the intellectual cognitions are made known seems miraculous. For they are not always manifested through the speech of the "medium", but very often are indicated by blows and lines of the turning tables, or by painting and writing which are set down on paper by a magical hand, whether the paper be open or even closed in an envelope.

3°. Material apparitions. Deceased relatives, friends, acquaintances, and other spirits make their appearance clothed in sensible form, offering little flowers, leaving traces of bodily limbs, or permitting their photograph to be taken, finally bringing about all those things which are called "materialisations" of spirits. Nevertheless doubt remains whether the "materialisations" really occurred or not. The mutual suggestion of those present and hallucinations of the senses are easily mingled with these things, but above all fraud. For very often it has been proved that the "materialised spirit" was in reality the body of the "medium"; that the "medium" had disguised the little flowers offered by the "spirits" or the photographs of the departed in clothes, hair, etc. Wherefore all phenomena of this kind become suspect.

b) The spiritistic phenomena are judged. Although spiritistic phenomena are explained in one way by some and in another by others, it is nevertheless certain that they have nothing to do with miracles. For:

1°. Almost all spiritistic phenomena appear to be natural. The key to this natural explanation is furnished by the turning tables themselves. For the turning of the tables can be effected not only by those who affect conversation with the spirits of the other world, but also by those who abhor all commerce with spirits. Therefore the cause of this phenomenon is not preternatural, but natural. As innumerable experiments testify, it consists in a certain nervous force. For just as mineral magnetism inheres in certain minerals and metals, so in the nerves of men there inheres an animal magnetism, similar to the electric fluid.⁹

Animal magnetism not only cures certain diseases after the manner of hypnotism,¹⁰ but also moves from their place the bodies to which it is applied. It is applied, moreover, and passes into bodies, especially during a certain state of psychical exaltation. Whence "hypnospiritistic mediums" and fantastic séances are especially fitted to produce the turning of tables and kindred phenomena. To the experiment of the turning tables, moreover, are related all the local motions proper to spiritism. For if tables can be moved and shaken by the nervous fluid, why could not they themselves and other bodies be lifted on high? Why could not musical sounds be produced by the motion of instruments, or blows and unusual noises by the motion of other bodies?

To the same magnetico-electric fluid can be attributed, at least in part, the intellectual revelations, i. e. the wonderful manner in which the cognitions of the "mediums" or of the other persons present at the séance are made known. For since the turning of the tables can be effected by the nervous fluid at the nod of the "mediums" or of the other agents, nothing forbids that the same fluid, at the pleasure of the agents, trace blows or lines on the tables. How, however, the same magnetic force can write on open paper, or on paper closed in envelopes of copper and stone, with or without a pen, is indeed not clear to me. The same is to be said a fortiori of the "materialisations" of the spirits. In no way is it proved that by the magnetic fluid the bodies of the departed can be shown, nay, photographs taken and traces of limbs impressed. If, therefore, the truth of the phenomena be supposed, those "materialisations" seem to be referred to a preternatural cause.

2°. If some spiritistic phenomena are preternatural, they are not divine.

Neither God himself nor the spirits familiar to God, namely the good angels and the blessed souls of the departed, can mingle in spiritism.

For the system of spiritism is a sink of error and impiety. It denies the existence of a personal God, preaching a certain hypersupernaturalistic pantheism no less than a materialistic one. It thinks Christ a mere man, or even a "materialised" spirit, whose miracles it attributes to occultistic machinations. Finally it denies all religious truths, except the immortality of the human soul. But even this immortality it understands falsely. For it opines that the spiritual soul is surrounded by a corporeal ethereal substance, which it therefore calls the "perispirit" (perisprit) or astral body (Astralleib). This astral body it holds to be the medium by which men on earth and the departed in heaven are physically united and spiritistic commerce is instituted. The heavenly life of the departed and the earthly life of the living it depraves with a gross sensualism. It is evident, therefore, that both God and the spirits friendly to God are far removed from this system.

Individual occultistic séances dishonor God and the spirits friendly to God no less than the whole system of occultism. For those sessions are convened for the sake of vanity, cupidity, and superstition; they are carried on by "hysterical" and for the most part suspect "mediums", with a ridiculous apparatus, with a concourse of "spirits" knocking, making noises, and trifling; they are finished with wholly futile, false, and pernicious things and revelations. In such sessions God and the good spirits certainly cannot take part. Nay, God cannot permit that at the pleasure of the "mediums" the good spirits be able to be summoned and to appear in occultistic sessions. Therefore if spiritism contains preternatural phenomena, they are produced by the evil spirits and are referred to the diabolical wonders.

3. Diabolical wonders. Pure spirits can by their natural force effect works which are miracles with respect to us, or relative [miracles].¹¹ And indeed this natural power belongs not only to the good angels, but also to the demons. For "all the power and might of operating ad extra which is natural to the angels remained intact in the demons after sin, since by sin the natural [endowments] in the angels were not diminished, much less lost.¹²

If these relative miracles are effected by the good angels, they have the same value and probative force as miracles wrought by God himself. For the good spirits, intimately united to God in all things, work only good things, and those for a good end. They can in no way favor falsehood and iniquity. Wherefore miracles made either by God or by the good angels are simply divine signs.

The question, however, arises whether it is lawful to discern these divine signs from diabolical works.¹³ We grant that sometimes it is difficult to discern the two from each other; for the most part, however, diabolical wonders are easily distinguished from miracles by reason of the work that is done, the circumstances under which it is done, and the end to which it is done.

a) The work that is done. Spirits are able to act on the world by locomotive force alone.¹⁴

Hence the following are not diabolical:

1°. Works which are above locomotive force. By locomotive force only translations and the alterations dependent on them can be produced. Therefore the demons are incapable of the production of bodies, by which substances are either created or generated or multiplied. Likewise they cannot cause the animations by which dead bodies are given life, e. g. restore the skin destroyed by leprosy; give sight to a blind man deprived of the visual organ; raise to life a man who has died. Finally they cannot effect the transformations by which bodies are constituted intrinsically different from what they were before, as when water was changed by Christ into wine.¹⁵ These effects therefore are absolute miracles, possible of performance to God alone.

2°. Works which are beside locomotive force, i. e. which are done with no locomotive force applied. This happens as often as the effect is produced not by touch or physical impact, but by nod or moral command. For it must not be thought that "this matter of visible things serves those transgressor angels at their nod, but God"¹⁶

Hence even the local translations and alterations of bodies themselves, if they are effected by a mere nod, cannot be ascribed to the demons. The demons can indeed cure a disease by bringing and applying remedies, or satisfy a multitude by bringing loaves from elsewhere, or calm a storm by locally constraining the elements; they cannot, however, do so by commanding. Whence, e. g., all the evangelical miracles are by that very fact divine, because they were effected by a mere command of voice and will.

If, however, some work is such that it can in itself be done by a demon, it is to be learned from the circumstances whether it was really done by diabolical force or not.

b) The circumstances under which the work is done pertain both to the medium and to the manner of the wonderful work.

1°. The medium of the wonderful operation. If the thaumaturge is a man of sound mind and peaceful spirit, if he is pious and holy, modest and humble, endowed with all the qualities of a legate of God, and fleeing the help of the devil, there is no doubt that he does not operate with the power of the evil spirit. If not, he is highly suspect. For although God can use even an unworthy medium for working miracles, for the most part nevertheless he uses a worthy one.

2°. The manner of the wonderful operation. If in the deed wrought nothing is found but what is honest, grave, wise, worthy of God, and salutary to men, it is to be attributed to God or to the good angel. To the devil, however, it is to be ascribed if superstitious, obscene, ridiculous, and cruel things occur. For the superstitious is opposed to divine truth, the obscene to divine sanctity, the ridiculous to divine majesty, the cruel to divine goodness.

If finally, even with the circumstances weighed, the origin of the wonderful work remains doubtful, recourse is to be had to its end itself.

3°. The end to which the work tends. The end of a divine miracle is twofold: ultimate and proximate.

α) The ultimate end of a miracle is the glory of God, to the promotion of which all divine works tend. The demons, however, can never work for the glory of God, so far as in them lies, because they are necessarily hostile to God and to his worshippers. Even if they sometimes boast of the glory of God and the eternal salvation of men, in their works there will always be something by which diabolical perversity is betrayed. Otherwise, as Christ testifies, "Satan would be divided against himself".¹⁷

Wherefore a work cannot be diabolical which consists wholly in this: that it inculcates the knowledge and love of God, commends the divine virtues, leads men to God, strengthens the kingdom of God. On the contrary, certainly diabolical is a wonderful deed which has an evil end, namely human glory, the corruption of morals, the neglect of religion, or at least an end unworthy of God, such as gain and curiosity.

β) The proximate end of a miracle is chiefly this, that it manifest to men the will and truth of God. For just as from the natural works of God we know the natural truths of religion, so from the supernatural works of God, namely miracles, we learn the supernatural truths. Whence God has implanted in men the invincible persuasion that works wholly exceeding the forces of corporeal nature certainly prove the divine origin of the doctrine in favor of which they are done, and to which the negative criteria already lend their support.

Wherefore men would be led into invincible error if God suffered works miraculous with respect to us to be done in favor of a doctrine which is falsely said to be revealed. Such invincible error, moreover, God is wholly bound to prevent by the same right by which a king must prevent forgers from using his seal for sealing forged decrees. As therefore divine providence restrains the power of the devil, lest he disturb natural things to the irreparable ruin of the world, so too it will wholly prohibit the demons from working miracles by which the supernatural order of revelation would necessarily be subverted. Therefore a relative miracle wrought to prove the divine origin of a doctrine for which the negative criteria militate cannot be from the devil.

Nothing, however, forbids God to suffer the demons to do relative wonders in favor of a doctrine destitute of the negative criteria. For it is evident of itself that a doctrine destitute of these criteria is not divinely revealed, and hence the wonders accompanying it cannot be divine miracles. Wherefore sacred Scripture expressly says that God suffers the demons to defend their errors by prodigies. For Christ says: "False prophets will arise and will give great signs and wonders, so as to lead into error, if possible, even the elect."¹⁸ Likewise St. Paul writes of the antichrist: "And then that iniquitous one will be revealed ... whose coming is according to the working of Satan, in all power and signs and lying wonders, and in all the seduction of iniquity."¹⁹ Nay, even pagan and ecclesiastical writers relate certain prodigies, whether feigned or real, in confirmation of idolatrous worship.²⁰