s body was uncorrupted and
the organs underanged; it was not the soul of the boy which animated
it, but the demon which replaced his spirit.

Philo believed that as there are good and bad angels, there are also
good and bad souls or spirits, and that the souls which descend into
the bodies bring to them their own good or bad qualities.

We see by the Gospel that the Jews of the time of our Saviour believed
that one man could be animated by several souls. Herod imagined that
the spirit of John the Baptist, whom he had beheaded, had entered into
Jesus Christ,[519] and worked miracles in him. Others fancied that
Jesus Christ was animated by the spirit of Elias,[520] or of Jeremiah,
or some other of the ancient prophets.

Footnotes:

[518] Art. ii. p. 14.

[519] Mark vi. 16, 17.

[520] Matt. xvi. 14.

CHAPTER XXXIV.

EXAMINATION OF THE OPINION WHICH CONCLUDES THAT THE DEMON CAN RESTORE
MOTION TO A DEAD BODY.

We cannot approve these opinions of Jews which we have just shown.
They are contrary to our holy religion, and to the dogmas of our
schools. But we believe that the spirit which once inspired Elijah,
for instance, rested on Elisha, his disciple; and that the Holy Spirit
which inspired the first animated the second also, and even St. John
the Baptist, who, according to the words of Jesus Christ, came in the
power of Elijah to prepare a highway for the Messiah. Thus, in the
prayers of the Church, we pray to God to fill his faithful servants
with the spirit of the saints, and to inspire them with a love for
that which they loved, and a detestation of that which they hated.

That the demon, and even a good angel by the permission or commission
of God, can take away the life of a man appears indubitable. The angel
which appeared to Zipporah,[521] as Moses was returning from Midian to
Egypt, and threatened to slay his two sons because they were not
circumcised; as well as the one who slew the first-born of the
Egyptians,[522] and the one who is termed in Scripture _the Destroying
Angel_, and who slew the Hebrew murmurers in the wilderness;[523] and
the angel who was near slaying Balaam and his ass;[524] the angel who
killed the soldiers of Sennacherib, he who smote the first seven
husbands of Sara, the daughter of Raguel;[525] and, finally, the one
with whom the Psalmist menaces his enemies, all are instances in proof
of this.[526]

Does not St. Paul, speaking to the Corinthians of those who took the