though they are hysterical, does it
follow that others, smitten with the same malady as they, are not
possessed? It would have to be demonstrated also that all demonopathics
are hysterical, and that is false, for there are women of sound mind and
perfectly good sense who are demonopathic without knowing it. And
admitting that the last point is controvertible, there remains this
unanswerable question: is a woman possessed because she is hysterical,
or is she hysterical because she is possessed? Only the Church can
answer. Science cannot.

"No, come to think it over, the effrontery of the positivists is
appalling. They decree that Satanism does not exist. They lay everything
at the account of major hysteria, and they don't even know what this
frightful malady is and what are its causes. No doubt Charcot determines
very well the phases of the attack, notes the nonsensical and passional
attitudes, the contortionistic movements; he discovers hysterogenic
zones and can, by skilfully manipulating the ovaries, arrest or
accelerate the crises, but as for foreseeing them and learning the
sources and the motives and curing them, that's another thing. Science
goes all to pieces on the question of this inexplicable, stupefying
malady, which, consequently, is subject to the most diversified
interpretations, not one of which can be declared exact. For the soul
enters into this, the soul in conflict with the body, the soul
overthrown in the demoralization of the nerves. You see, old man, all
this is as dark as a bottle of ink. Mystery is everywhere and reason
cannot see its way."

"Mmmm," said Durtal, who was now in front of his door. "Since anything
can be maintained and nothing is certain, succubacy has it. Basically it
is more literary--and cleaner--than positivism."

CHAPTER X

The day was long and hard to kill. Waking at dawn, full of thoughts of
Mme. Chantelouve, he could not stay in one place, and kept inventing
excuses for going out. He had no cakes, bonbons, and exotic liqueurs,
and one must not be without all the little essentials when expecting a
visit from a woman. He went by the longest route to the avenue de
l'Opera to buy fine essences of cedar and of that alkermes which makes
the person tasting it think he is in an Oriental pharmaceutic
laboratory. "The idea is," he said, "not so much to treat Hyacinthe as
to astound her by giving her a sip of an unknown elixir."

He came back laden with packages, then we