e plague in Egypt, see Haeser,
'Lehrbuch der Geschichte der Medicin und der epidemischen Krankheiten,
Jena, 1875-'82, vol. iii, pp. 15 et seq.

Moreover, comets, falling stars, and earthquakes were thought, upon
scriptural authority, to be "signs and wonders"--evidences of the
Divine wrath, heralds of fearful visitations; and this belief, acting
powerfully upon the minds of millions, did much to create a panic-terror
sure to increase epidemic disease wherever it broke forth.

The main cause of this immense sacrifice of life is now known to have
been the want of hygienic precaution, both in the Eastern centres, where
various plagues were developed, and in the European towns through which
they spread. And here certain theological reasonings came in to resist
the evolution of a proper sanitary theory. Out of the Orient had been
poured into the thinking of western Europe the theological idea that the
abasement of man adds to the glory of God; that indignity to the body
may secure salvation to the soul; hence, that cleanliness betokens pride
and filthiness humility. Living in filth was regarded by great numbers
of holy men, who set an example to the Church and to society, as an
evidence of sanctity. St. Jerome and the Breviary of the Roman Church
dwell with unction on the fact that St. Hilarion lived his whole life
long in utter physical uncleanliness; St. Athanasius glorifies St.
Anthony because he had never washed his feet; St. Abraham's most
striking evidence of holiness was that for fifty years he washed neither
his hands nor his feet; St. Sylvia never washed any part of her body
save her fingers; St. Euphraxia belonged to a convent in which the nuns
religiously abstained from bathing. St. Mary of Egypt was eminent for
filthiness; St. Simnon Stylites was in this respect unspeakable--the
least that can be said is, that he lived in ordure and stench
intolerable to his visitors. The Lives of the Saints dwell with
complacency on the statement that, when sundry Eastern monks showed a
disposition to wash themselves, the Almighty manifested his displeasure
by drying up a neighbouring stream until the bath which it had supplied
was destroyed.

The religious world was far indeed from the inspired utterance
attributed to John Wesley, that "cleanliness is near akin to godliness."
For century after century the idea prevailed that filthiness was akin to
holiness; and, while we may well believe that the devotion of the clergy
to