y in most things to that which alone the Christians
studied, which alone they valued, after the example of the Jews and
Arabs.

How did men come to this result? Undoubtedly by the simple effect of
the great Satanic principle, that _everything must be done the wrong
way_, the very opposite way to that followed by the holy people. These
latter have a dread of poisons. Satan uses them and turns them into
remedies. The Church thinks by spiritual means, by sacraments and
prayers, to act even on the body. Satan, on the other hand, uses
material means to act even upon the soul, making you drink of
forgetfulness, love, reverie, and every passion. To the blessing of
the priest he opposes the magnetic passes made by the soft hands of
women, who cheat you of your pains.

* * * * *

By a change of system, and yet more of dress, as in the substitution
of linen for wool, the skin-diseases lost their intensity. Leprosy
abated, but seemed to go inwards and beget deeper ills. The fourteenth
century wavered between three scourges--the epileptic dancings, the
plague, and the sores which, according to Paracelsus, led the way to
syphilis.

The first danger was not the least. About 1350 it broke out in a
frightful manner with the dance of St. Guy, and was singular
especially in this, that it did not act upon each person separately.
As if carried on by one same galvanic current, the sick caught each
other by the hand, formed immense chains, and spun and spun round till
they died. The spectators, who laughed at first, presently catching
the contagion, let themselves go, fell into the mighty current,
increased the terrible choir.

What would have happened if the evil had held on as long as leprosy
did even in its decline?

It was the first step, as it were, towards epilepsy. If that
generation of sufferers had not been cured, it would have begotten
another decidedly epileptic. What a frightful prospect! Think of
Europe covered with fools, with idiots, with raging madmen! We are not
told how the evil was treated and checked. The remedy prescribed by
most, the falling upon these jumpers with kicks and cuffings, was
entirely fitted to increase the frenzy and turn it into downright
epilepsy.[46] Doubtless there was some other remedy, of which people
were loth to speak. At the time when witchcraft took its first great
flight, the widespread use of the _Solaneae_, above all, of belladonna,
vulgarized the medici