CHAPTER I.

Preparations of drugs and beverages ; some soporific, others for producing temporary imbecility. Circé ; Nepenthes. Delight- ful illusions ; fearful illusions ; involuntary revelations ; invin- cible courage, produced by meats and potions. — The Old Man of the Mountains deceived his disciples by illusions : he pro- bably fortified them against torture by stupifying drugs. The use of them becomes habitual, and conduces to bodily insensi- bility and imbecility.
Triumphant over the obstacles which debarred him from attaining perfection, the initiated beheld all the hidden treasures of science laid open to him. It was no difficult task for him to unravel the secret of the won- ders that, in the scenes of his first reception, penetrated him with religious admiration : but destined, thenceforth, to lay open to the profane the path of light, it was time he should learn to what operations he himself had been submitted ; how his whole moral being had been sub- jected to their influences, and how he must employ the same means that had been used in his initiation, in order to
VOL. II. B
2 PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION.
obtain dominion over the minds of those who might aim at attaining to the same point at which he had arrived, and by what means he should display himself all power- ful by his works, before those who were not permitted to participate in the divine dignity of the priesthood.
The aspirants to initiation, and those who came to request prophetic dreams of the Gods, were prepared by a fast, more or less prolonged, after which they partook of meals expressly prepared ; and also of mysterious drinks, such as the water of Lethe* and the water of Mnemosyne in the grotto of Trophonius; or of the Ciceion in the mysteries of the Eleusinia. Different drugs were easily mixed up with the meats, or, introduced into the drinks, according to the state of mind or body into which it was necessary to throw the recipient, and the nature of the visions he was desirous of procuring.
We know what accusations had been raised against some of the early sects of Christianity, charges which were unjustly reflected upon all christian assemblies. They would scarcely be considered as unfounded, had many heresiarchs adopted the criminal practices imputed by popular rumour to the high-priests of the Markesians.f
* The river which yielded the water of Lethe, and the fountain Mnemosyne, were both near the Trophonian grotto, which was in Beotia. The waters of both were drunk by whoever consulted the oracle ; the Lethian draught was intended to make him forget all his former thoughts ; the Mnemosynian to strengthen his me- mory, that he might remember the visions which he was about to see in the grotto. The latter seemed essential, as the consulter was obliged, after emerging from the grotto, and recovering from his alarm, to write down his vision on a small tablet which was preserved in the temple. — Ed.
f The Markesians were a sect named from their chief, the
PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION. à
It is said that in their religious ceremonies aphrodisaic beverages were administered to women. Without judg- ing in this particular case, we believe that powerful aphro- disiacs* were occasionally used in the mysterious orgies of polytheism ; and it is only by admitting such a sup- position, that we can explain the monstrous debaucheries to which the votaries of Bacchus gave themselves up in the Bacchanalian festivals, denounced and punished at Rome, in the year 186, before Christ. A scene in a romance by Petroniusf shows that they were used much later in the nocturnal reunions where superstitious rites were employed as a veil and an excuse for the excesses of libertinism. But such an expedient was extremely limited in its power ; it disordered the senses ; yet it did not act on the imagination, though it delivered up the phy- sical man to the power of the guilty Thaumaturgist ; it did not destroy the moral faculty. The substances destined to produce, in secret ceremonies, the most important effects, were the simplest and most common opiates. We may
heresiarch Mark, who was guilty of so many superstitions and impostures. Among others, St. Irenseus informs us, that in con- secrating chalices filled with water and wine, according to the Christian rite, he filled the chalices with a certain red liquor which he called blood. He also permitted women to consecrate the holy mysteries. — Butler's Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, 8çc. vol. v. chap, xxviii.
* S. Epiphan. contr. Haereses. lib. i. tome in. contr. Marco- sios. Haeres. 24.
t Arbiter Petronius is supposed to have been a fictitious name bestowed upon the romance alluded to in the text ; whilst others assert that the romance was the production of Caius Petronius, a favourite of Nero, and a minister to his vicious pleasures. The work is a picture of the profligate manners of the period it de- scribes, totally unfit for general perusal. — Ed.
B 2
4 PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION.
readily conceive of what service they were to the Thaumaturgist ; whether intended to close eyes too observing, and too quick to scrutinize the causes of the apparent miracles ; or to produce the alternatives of an unconquerable sleep, and a sudden awakening; effects well adapted to persuade the man who expe- riences them, that a supernatural power is sporting with his existence, and changing at his pleasure every circumstance that troubles or that amuses it. Their methods were various ; a collection that we possess, and from which we shall quote, furnishes us with two ex- amples. In one case we are informed that a young Prince was sent to sleep every evening by the juice of a plant, and every morning recovered from his torpor by the scent of a perfume.* Again — a sponge steeped in vinegar, and passed under the nose of Aben Hassan, provoked sneezing and a slight vomiting, which sud- denly destroyed the effects of the soporific powder which rendered him insensible. In another instance, the same symptoms and results were produced, when a young Princess, who had been sent into a deep sleep by a narcotic, was exposed to the open air.f
In a spot, far removed from the scenes of the thou- sand and one nights, we find the employment of a similar secret. Among the Nadoessis J in South Ame- rica, there existed a religious society of men devoted to the Great Spirit. Carver witnessed the admission of a new member into it. The priests threw into the mouth of the candidate something that resembled a bean :
* The Arabian Nights, xxvith Night, tome i. p. 221.
f The Arabian Nights, ccxcvth Night, vol. iv. p. 97 — 149.
X Carver. Travels in South America, p. 200 — 201.
PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION. 5
almost immediately he fell down, immoveable, insensible, and apparently dead. They gave him violent blows on the back, but these did not restore sensibility; nor, for some minutes, bring him as it were to life again. When he did revive, he was agitated with convulsions, that did not cease until he had thrown up what they had made him swallow. *
Plutarch has preserved to us a description of the mysteries of Trophonius, related by a man who had passed two nights and a day in the grotto, f They appear to be rather the dreams of a person intoxicated by a powerful narcotic than the description of a real spectacle. Timarches, the name of the initiate, ex- perienced a violent head-ache, when the apparitions commenced; that is to say, when the drugs began to affect his senses, and when the apparitions vanished and he awoke from this delirious- slumber, the same pain was as keenly felt. Timarches died three months after his visit to the grotto ; the priests, no doubt, having made use of very powerful drugs. It is said that those who had once consulted the oracle acquired a melancholy which lasted all their lives, j the natural consequence, no doubt, of the serious shock to their health from the potions administered to them.
The consulters of the oracle, were, I believe, carried
* It is probable that the seed employed was the fruit of a species of Strychnos, the effect of which is to produce paralysis, with con- vulsions. That it did not cause death might depend on the entire seed having been swallowed ; its influence in that state being con- siderably less than if it had been administered in powder. — Ed.
f Plutarch. De Dœmonio Socratis.
t Suidas . , . Clavier, Mémoire sur les Oracles, etc. p. 159— 160.
6 PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION.
to the gate of the grotto, when their forced sleep began to be dissipated. The visions that occupied this slum- ber most probably formed (as has been also suspected by Clavier*) all the incidents of the miraculous spectacle they believed to have been exhibited by the Gods. On awakening also after having been presented with a drink, probably intended to restore entirely the use of their senses, they were ordered to relate every thing they had seen and heard ; the priest requiring to know what they had dreamed.
Powerful soporifics often possess the property of deranging the intellect : the berries of the Belladonnaf when eaten produce furious madness, followed by a sleep that lasts twenty-four hours. Still more frequently than bodily sleep, the sleep of the soul, temporary imbecility, delivers up man to the power of those who could reduce him to this humiliating state. The juice of the Daturaj seed is employed by the Portuguese women of Goa : they
* Clavier. Mémoire sur les Oracles, &c. p. 158 — 159.
t Atropa Belladonna, Deadly Nightshade, has fruit resembling a black cherry, seated within a large, green, persistent flower-cup or calyx. The fruit is of a deep black-purple colour, and contains many seeds, enveloped in a sweetish juice. Every part of the plant is poisonous, and when eaten causes symptoms resembling those of intoxication, with fits of laughter and violent gesticulations, fol- lowed by dilatation of the pupils of the eyes, delirium, and death. Buchanan, the Scottish historian, states that the victory of Mac- beth over the Danes was obtained chiefly by mixing the juice of this plant with wine, which was sent as a donation from the Scots to Sweno during a truce. He adds, "vis fructui, radici, ae maxime semini somnifera, et quae in amentium, si largius sumantur, agat." — Rerum Scot. Hist. lib. vm. § vi. — Ed.
X Datura ferox, in doses sufficiently large to affect the brain, causes indistinctness of vision, with a disposition to restless
PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION. 7
mix it, says Linschott,* in the liquor drank by their hus- bands, who fall, for twenty-four hours at least, into a stupor accompanied by continued laughing ; but so deep is the sleep, that nothing passing before them affects them ; and when they recover their senses, they have no recol- lection of what has taken place. The men, says Pyrard,f make use of the same secret in order to submit to their desires women who would consent by no other means. Francis Martin,j after having detailed all the injurious eifects of the Daturas, adds, that the delirium may be arrested by placing the feet of the patient in hot water : the remedy causes vomiting, a circumstance which reminds us of the manner in which the sleeper and the young Princess in the Arabian Nights, and the initiated Na- doëssis, were delivered from their stupor.
A secret so effectual having fallen into the hands of the ignorant, must, there is reason to believe, have belonged to
sleep, accompanied with delirium, in which the most ridiculous actions and absurd positions are exhibited. All the Daturas, namely, fastuosa ; Metel : Tatula ; and even Stramonium, which is employed as a medicine in this country, possess nearly similar poisonous properties. The species Metel and Tatula are employed in the East Indies to cause intoxication for licentious and criminal purposes. — Ed.
* Linschott. Narrative of a Voyage to the East Indies, with the notes of Paludanus. 3rd edition, folio, pp. 63, 64, 111. The Thorn Apple, Stramonium, a plant of the same family as the Datura, produces similar effects ; it has sometimes been criminally
employed in Europe.
f Voyage of Francis Pyrard. (2 vols. in-4°. Paris 1679). tome
ii. p. 68—69.
+ Francis Martin. Description of the first Voyage made by the
French to the East Indies, p. 163 — 164.
8 PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION.
the Thaumaturgists to whom it was much more impor- tant. Among the aborigines of Virginia, the aspirant to the priesthood was made to drink, during the course of his painful initiation, a liquor* which threw him into a state of imbecility. If, as we may suppose, the object of this practise was to render him docile, we may believe also, that the custom did not commence in the New World.f Magicians have, in all ages, made use of similar secrets.
The Oriental tales frequently present to us stories of powerful magicians changing men into animals. Varro, quoted by St. Augustine,! relates that the magicians of Italy, attracting near them the unsuspecting traveller, administered to him, in cheese, a drug which changed him into a beast of burthen. They loaded him then with their baggage, and at the end of the journey res- tored him to his own form. Under these figurative expressions, quoted from Varro, who probably quoted from some prior work, we perceive that the traveller being intoxicated by the drug he had taken, blindly submitted himself to this singular degradation until the magician released him by giving him an appropriate antidote. This tradition has no doubt the same origin as that of Circe. ||
* This liquor was procured by decoction from certain roots called Vissocan ; and the initiation was termed Husea nawar.
f In consulting most of the Grecian oracles, it was the custom either for the officiating priest, or the consulting person, to drink of some secret well, the water of which most probably contained some narcotic infusion. — Ed.
% S. August. De civit. Dei. lib. xvm. cap. xvn. xvm.
|| This does not contradict the assertion of Solinus, that Circé
PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION. 9
Wearied by the amorous pursuit of Calchus, King of the Daunians, Circé, if we may believe Parthenius, invited him to a banquet, in all the viands of which she had infused narcotic drugs. Hardly had he eaten of them, when he fell into such imbecility that Circé shut him up with the swine. She afterwards cured him, and restored him to the Daunians, binding them, however, by a vow, never to allow him to return to the island she inhabited.
The cup of Circé, says Homer, contained a poison that transformed men into beasts ; implying that, when plunged by it into a state of stupid inebriety, they be- lieved themselves reduced to this shameful degradation. This explanation, the only one admissible, agrees with the relation of Parthenius. In spite of the decision of some commentators, I venture to affirm, that the poet did not intend this narration as an allegorical lesson against voluptuousness. Such an explanation would not accord with the rest of the narrative, which terminates by the wise Ulysses throwing himself into the arms of the enchantress, who kept him there a whole year. In many other passages, also, of his poems, Homer has noticed purely physical facts. This is so true that he mentions a natural preservative against the effect of poison ; a root which he describes with that minuteness, which,better than any other poet,he knew how to unite with the brilliancy of poetry and the elegance of versification.
Neither can we take, in a figurative sense, the account
deceived the eyes by phantasmagorial illusions. She might make use of these to strengthen the established belief, that the drugs which rendered men imbecile, metamorphosed them into beasts.
10 PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION.
given by the prince of poets, respecting the Nepenthes which, bestowed by Helen on Telemachus, had the effect of suspending all feelings of grief in the heart of the hero.# Whatever might have been the substance thus designated, it is certain that in Homer's time, there was a belief in the existence of certain liquors, which were not less stupifying than wine, and more efficacious than the juice of the grape, in dif-
* Many opinions have been advanced respecting Nepenthes ; but the most probable is, that which refers it to the hemp, Caunabis satira, from which the Hindoos make their bang, which is narcotic, and produces delightful dreams.
The native plant, after it has flowered, is dried, and sold in the bazaars of Calcutta for smoking, under the name Ganjah. The large leaves and capsules employed also for smoking, are called Bang or Subjee. In both of these forms the smoking of the Hemp causes a species of intoxication of a most agreeable description, and consequently the plant has acquired many epithets, which maybe translated " assuager of sorrow," " increaser of pleasure," " cémenter of friendship," "laughter-mover;" and several others of the same description.
In Nepaul, the resin only is used, under the name of Churrus. It is collected in some places by naked coolies walking through the fields of hemp at the time when the plant exudes the resin, which sticks to their skin, from which it is scraped off, and kneaded into balls. In whatever manner it is collected, when it is taken in doses of from a grain to two grains, it causes not only the most delightful delirium ; but, when repeated, it is followed by catalepsy, or that condition of insensibility to all external impres- sions which enables the body to be, as it were, moulded into any position, like a Dutch jointed doll, in which the limbs remain in the position in which they are placed, however contrary to the natural influence of gravity ; and this state will continue for many hours. Such an instrument could not fail to prove a most power- ful agent in working apparent miracles in the hands of a Thau- maturgist. — Ed.
PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION. 1 1
fusing a delicious calm over the mind. It is probable that Homer was acquainted with these beverages, and those also that Circé poured out for her guests ; either from having witnessed the exhibition of their effects, or from tradition only ; it always appears from his narrative, that the ancients possessed the means of making them. Wherefore should we, then, doubt, that such a secret was practised in the tem- ples, whence the Greek poet derived the greatest part of his knowledge ; and where all the secrets of experi- mental philosophy were concentrated.
Roman and Greek historians, and also modern na- turalists, in speaking of the properties of different beverages, mention facts, which prove that they were known to the ancient Thaumaturgist, and that their powers have not been exaggerated.
A. Laguna, in his Commentary on Dioscorides, men- tions a species of Solarium, the root of which taken in wine, in a dose of a drachm weight, fills the imagination with the most delicious illusions. It is well known that Opium, when administered in certain quantities, produces sleep accompanied with dreams so distinct and so agree- able that no reality can equal the charm of them.* In
* The magical influence of opium is well described, allowing for some degree of exaggeration in M. de Quincy's extraordinary work entitled The Confessions of an English Opium Eater, to which the editor refers the reader. It is necessary to mention here only a few facts descriptive of its influence on the inhabitants of Turkey and India.
In the Teriakana, or opium shops of Constantinople, and throughout the Ottoman empire, opium is usually mixed with aromatics, and made into small cakes or lozenges, which are
12 PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION.
recapitulating all the speculations that have been made respecting Nepenthes, M. Virey supposes that he has discovered it to be the Hy osciamus Datura ofForskhal,* which is still employed for the same purpose in Egypt, and throughout the East. Many other substances, capa-
stamped with the words '* Mash Allah," — gift of God. After a certain number of these have been swallowed, the first effect is a degree of vivacity, which is even followed by delirium and hallu- cinations, that vary in their character, according to the natural disposition of the individual. Is the opium-eater ambitious, he beholds his sublime ideas realized, monarchs at his feet, and slaves in chains following his triumphant chariot. Is he timid, he feels himself either endowed with courage to which he is naturally a stranger, or scenes of horror and dismay arise before him ; the brain of the lover heaves with tenderness and rapture ; that of the vindictive man swells with a ferocious delight, in feeling his victim within his power, and his dagger already in his heart. High-flown compliments are uttered, and the most ridiculous actions performed, until sleep overpowers the senses, and leaves the person on awaking pensive, melancholy, and ex- hausted, until recourse is again had to the regular daily supply.
In China, Siam, Bornea, and Sumatra, opium prepared in a peculiar manner, and called Chandoo, is both eaten and smoked with nearly the same effects as the Turks experience ; but it ren- ders the Malays almost frantic. When misfortune, therefore, or a desire of desperate revenge influences a Malay, he makes him- self delirious with opium ; then sallies forth armed, and running forward calling out " Amok ! amok !" he attempts to stab, indis- criminately, every one he meets, until he himself is killed for the preservation of others.
Such is the apparent supernatural felicity in some, and the demoniacal frenzy and wretchedness in others, which the juice of the poppy occasions ; and there can be little doubt that it was administered in some form to the aspirants during their initiation into the mysteries of Polytheism. — Ed.
* Bulletin de Pharmacie, tome v. (Février, 1813,) p. 49 and 60.
PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION. 13
ble of producing effects not less marvellous, are mentioned by the same learned person.
The Potamantis, or Thalasseglé, says Pliny,* grows on the banks of the Indus, and Gelatophyllis near to Bactria. The juices extracted from both these plants produce delirium ; the one causing extraordinary visions, the other exciting continual laughter. The one acts in a similar manner as the beverage made with the Hyosciamus of Forskhal ; the other like that expressed from the seeds of the Datura f Other compositions con- cealed virtues still more useful to the workers of miracles.
In Ethiopia, says ï)iodorus, j was a square lake of a hundred and sixty feet in circumference and forty feet broad, the waters of which were of the colour of ver- million, and exhaled an agreeable odour. Those who drank these waters became so delirious, that they con- fessed all their crimes, and even those that time had permitted them to forget. Ktesias|| mentions a foun- tain in India, the waters of which became, when newly drawn, like cheese. This coagulum when dis- solved in water possessed virtues like those mentioned by Diodorus. In the first example the name of lake, parti- cularly after the dimensions specified, reminds us of the sea of brass in the Temple of Jerusalem, which signified
* Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. xxiv. cap. xvn.
f All the Daturas are narcotic ; but, from its native place, that species mentioned by Pliny under the name Gelatophyllis, was either Datura fer ox or Datura metel. — Ed.
% Diod. Sic. lib. n. cap. xn. p. 12.
|| Ktesias. Indie, apud. Photium. Biblioth. cod. lxxii.
14 PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION.
only a large basin hollowed by the hand of man,* such as is seen in every village of Hindostan.f The word fountain as employed by Ktesias is equally applied to the spring whence water flows, and to a reservoir from which water is drawn. When we reflect on the colour and scent of the water contained in the Lake of Ethiopia ; the property of the Indian liquid of coagulating like cheese ; and call to remembrance also the fluid drugs employed by the magicians of Egypt ; do they not all announce pharma- ceutical preparations ?
Democritus had, before Ktesias and Diodorus, men- tioned plants that were endowed with such virtues, that they caused the guilty to confess what the most rigorous tortures would not have constrained them to avow. According to Pliny, j there is an Indian plant called Achœmenis, the root of which, when made into lozenges, and swallowed in wine during the day, torments the guilty all night. They suppose that they are pur- sued by the Gods, who appear to them under many forms ; and they confess their crimes. The juice of the Ophiusa, a plant of Ethiopia, when taken internally, creates a belief of being attacked by serpents : the terror that it produces is so violent, that it leads to
* Lacus, in Latin, often takes the same signification. Pliny applies this name to the hasin of a fountain situated near Man- durium, in the country of Salente. Vitruvius also applies it to a basin prepared for receiving lime.
f Some of these basins (tanks) are more than 23,239 yards in circumference. Haafner. Travels in the Western Peninsula of India, 8çc. passim, tome n. p. 299.
X Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. xxiv. cap. xvn.
PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION. 15
suicide ; therefore the sacrilegious were compelled to drink this liquor.
These wonders seem fabulous : they may be repeated, however, every day under the eye of the observer. The ex- tract of Belladonna is given to children affected with the hooping-cough : if the quantity exceeds ever so little the proper dose, this remedy occasions the most painful dreams that fill the little patients with fear. In Kamtschatka they distil from a sweet herb,* " a spirit which easily intoxi- cates in a very violent manner. Those who drink it, although even in very small quantities, yet are tormented during the night with fearful dreams ; and the following day they are afflicted by inquietudes and agitations as great as if they had committed some crime."
The muchamore is a fungus common to Kamtschatka and Siberia.f If it be eaten dry, or infused in liquor and drunk, it sometimes produces death, and always profound delirium, which is sometimes gay, sometimes full of sor- row and fear. Those who partake of it believe themselves subject to the irresistible power of the spirit that inhabits the poisonous fungus. In a fit of this stupor, a Cossack imagined that the spirit ordered him to confess his sins ; he made, therefore, a general confession before all his comrades.j
* Pastinaca. Gmelin.
f Krachenninikof. Description du Kamtschatka, lstpart.chap.xiv. Beniowski relates that a Siberian Schaman whom he consulted, made use of an infusion of muchamore ; the beverage first plunged him into raving delirium, and then into deep sleep.
% The Muchamore, the plant here referred to, is the Fly Ama- nita, Amanita Muscaria, found in Kamtschatka, and also abun-
] 6 PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION.
Other beverages have a different influence, but are equally capable of creating the marvellous. The Caliph Abdallah, son of Zobeir, when besieged in Mecca, decided on making a sally, and thus finding either deliverance or death. He received from the hands of his mother a beverage containing musk,# to sustain his courage; and he only yielded after prodigies of valour, which made the victory, for a long time, uncertain.! When the Turks go to battle, a strong drink, named maslach, mixed with opium, is distributed among the soldiers, and excites and renders them almost
dantly in the Highlands of Scotland, and in woods in England in the autumn. It is a beautiful plant, rising like a mushroom upon a white stalk four to eight inches high, bulbous at the base ; the pileus, or top, is from three to six inches broad, of an orange- brown colour, with white warty spots regularly scattered over its surface. It is the most splendid of the Agaricoid tribe. " In the Highlands of Scotland," says Dr. Greville (Scottish Cryptogamic Flora, vol i. p. 54,) "it is impossible not to admire it, as seen in long perspective between the trunks of the straight fir-trees ; and should a sunbeam penetrate through the dark and dense foliage, and rest on its vivid surface, an effect is produced by this chief of a humble race which .might lower the pride of many a patrician vegetable." It is always deleterious, and often fatal when eaten. In Kamtschatka its juice, mixed with that of the Great Bilberry, or the runners of the Willow Herb, is drank to cause intoxication. It acts most powerfully when dried and swallowed after mas- tication : it then causes delirium, and occasionally convulsions. —Ed.
* Musk is a powerful stimulant ; it raises the pulse without elevating the heat of the body ; and increases, in a remarkable degree, the energy of the brain and nerves. — Ed.
f Hegira, 73 ; Ockley. Histoire des Sarrasins, torn. n. p. 4—5.
PREPARATION OF ASPIRANTS TO INITIATION. 17
frantic* The intoxication produced by the much- amove often brings on an increase of strength, inspires fearless boldness, and excites a desire of committing criminal actions, which are then regarded as imperiously inspired by the Spirit of the Muchamore. The savage inhabitant of Kamtschatka, and the fierce Cossacks, have recourse to this intoxication to dissipate their fears when they project assassinations. f
The extract of hemp, mixed with opium, has, even in the eighteenth century, been used in the armies of the Hindoo Princes, by the Ammoqui, fanatic warriors, whom it makes fiercely delirious. They dart off, striking without distinction every thing they meet before them, until, overwhelmed with blows, they fall on the bodies of their victims.j Neither fear nor humanity arrests their course of crime. Those fanatics, also, who have been named Assassins, were intoxicated by a preparation of hemp, called Hashiche, given to them by the Old Man of the Mountain. i|
All the historians of the Crusades have spoken of the enchanted abode of the Old Man of the Mountain, § who
* Considérations sur la Guerre présente entre les Russes et les Turcs. 1769—173.
f Krachenninikof. Description du Kamtschatka. parti, chap. xiv.
% Paulin de St. Barthélemi. Voyage aux Indes Orientales, tome ii. p. 426—427.
|| J. Hammer. Mines of the East. Nouvelles Annales des Voyages, tome xxv. p. 337 — 378.
§ This is an absurd translation of the title of Seydna, and
Sheikh-al-Jebal, literally, Elder Mountain Chief, which was
assumed by Hassan Saba, a Chief of a sect of Eastern Ismailites,
who made himself master of Alamoot, one of the strong hill for-
VOL. II. C
18 TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION.
gave to his credulous neophytes such a foretaste of Para- dise, that the hope of one day returning to this place of
tresses which cover the mountainous region that divides Persian Irak and the northerly provinces of Dilem and Taberistan. The followers of Hassan were bound to the most rigid obedience to the precepts of Islam, or Abdallah Maimom, the projector of the sect. It is unnecessary here to describe the rules which were requisite to be practised by the aspirants, proselytes to the faith of the society. Assassination was an obligation on the Ismailite Fedavee, one of the divisions of the sect ; any one of whom, ordered by a superior to assassinate a stranger, was obliged to obey ; and, in the performance of the order, the wretched Fedavee firmly believed he was promoting the cause of truth. It has been supposed that the name Assassins, given to the society, originated in this obliga- tion ; but the appellation is derived, according to M. De Sacy, from the Oriental term Hashisheen, corrupted by the Crusaders into Assassin. This term implies takers of Hashiché, a species of hemp, from which an intoxicating drug was compounded, which the Fedavee took previously to their engaging in their daring enterprises ; and which procured for them the delicious visions of Paradise, promised to all the followers of the Sheikh-el-Jebal. This Paradise was typified on earth, according to Marco Paulo, who travelled over the East in the thirteenth century, by gardens of the most luxurious description, stored with the most delicious fruit and flagrant flowers and shrubs, and containing palaces inha- bited by exquisitely beautiful and highly- accomplished damsels, clothed in the richest dresses, and education to display every grace and fascination that could captivate the senses.
The Chief, in discoursing of Paradise to his followers, persuaded them that he had the power of granting admission to it ; and to prove the truth of his assertion, he caused a potion of a soporific kind to be administered to ten or twelve of them at a time, and when they were sound asleep, he had them conveyed to the palaces in the gar- den. On awaking from their sleep, their senses were struck with the beauty and splendour of every object upon which their eyes rested ; their ears were ravished with the most harmonious voices ; and their fond glances at the lovely damsels were returned with the most allur-
TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION. 19
delights, made them consent to the commission of every crime, brave the most cruel tortures, and undaunted
ing caresses ; until, truly intoxicated with the excess of enjoyment, they believed themselves actually in Paradise. After a time they were again thrown into sleep, and carried out of the garden. They were questioned before the whole Court as to where they had been, and what they had seen ; and having detailed all the pleasures they enjoyed, the Chief assured them that those who yielded implicit obedience to him should inherit such a Paradise for ever.
The effects of such an imposture display, most strikingly, the lengths to which credulity and superstition will conduct mortals . The following anecdote powerfully elucidates this remark. " An Ambassador from the Sultan Malek Schah having come to Ala- moot to demand submission and obedience of the Sheikh, Has- san received him in a hall in which he had assembled several -of his followers. Making a sign to one youth, he said, ' Kill thyself!' Instantly the young man's dagger was plunged into his own bosom. To another he said, ' Fling yourself down from the wall !' In an instant his shattered limbs were lying in the castle ditch. Then turning to the terrific envoy, he exclaimed — ■* I have seventy thousand followers who obey me after this fashion. This is my answer to your master!' "a These victims died in the full conviction that they were immediately to pass into that sensual Paradise, of which they had received a foretaste in the gardens of the Sheikh.
It is out of place to trace here the history of a people whose chief object was evil ; and who, for Providence provides retribution for crime even in this world, have ceased to live politically for nearly six centuries. The sect still exists in Persia, and scattered over great part of Asia. They regard their Imam as an incarnate ray of the Divinity ; they hold him in the highest veneration ; and they make pilgrimages from the most distant places to the village of Khekh, in the district of Koom, where he resides, to obtain his blessing. — Ed.
■* Marinus Sanatus, 1. in. Secret Societies, Library of Enter- taining Knowledge, p. 81.
c 2
20 TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION.
meet certain death. At a much earlier period, Shedad-ben- ad, King of Arabia, desiring to be worshipped as a God, col- lected in a garden, the name of which was proverbial in the East, all the delights of Paradise ; and allowed them to be enjoyed by the faithful whom he deigned to admit into it.# In both cases, we think that these gardens of pleasure only existed in dreams, caused among young men, habituated to a simple and austere diet by the use of potions to which they were unaccustomed, and which exalted their weak reasons, and filled their heated imagi- nations.! Under the name of Bendjé, a preparation of Hyosciamus (henbane) ,{ the same plant, no doubt, as the Hyosciamus datura, served to intoxicate them so com- pletely, that they believed themselves in Paradise, of which glowing descriptions had been previously given to them ; they experienced also a violent desire to be transported to it, even through death ; whilst, in order to incite them to some desperate act, the hashiché, or extract of hemp, was administered to them ; and is still employed in the East for the same purpose.
The real existence of the gardens of the Old Man of the Mountains has, nevertheless, been acknowledged by
* D'Herbelot. Bibliothèque Orientale, art. Iram.
f The foregoing note has proved that the opinion of this author is erroneous as far as regards the followers of Hassan Sabah. — Ed.
X M. J. Hammer (loc. cit.) appears to think that the Bendjé was the same thing as the hashiché ; but in a fragment of an Ara- bian romance, for the translation of which we are indebted to him, it is positively stated that the bendjé was a preparation of Henbane, p. 380.
I am disposed to differ from the opinion of our author respect- ing Bendjé, which I have been informed is a preparation of Hemp, Cannabis Indica. — Ed.
TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION. 21
enlightened men.# In opposition to them, however, we may be permitted to mention the basis upon which we had established our opinion to the contrary,! even before it acquired another degree of probability by the assent of M. Virey.j This is no deviation from our subject ; the wonders employed for operating upon the credulity of men by beings who pretended to be endowed with supernatural powers form a part of our inquiry.
The Old Man of the Mountain, whose history is obscured by so many fables, surrounded himself by a troop of fanatics, ready to dare every thing at his first signal. It is said, that their unbounded devotion was produced by a narcotic, during the effect of which they were transported into the most delicious gar- dens, where, when they awoke, every hixury was collected to make them believe, that for some hours they tasted the pleasures of Heaven. The exacti- tude of this recital may be questioned. How many indiscretions might every day compromise the existence of a fictitious Paradise ? How would it be possible to assemble and bind to inviolable secrecy so many agents, exempted from the fanaticism which their artifices produced in others, and who, not regarding silence as a duty, would, on the contrary, doubt
* MM. Malthe-Brun et J. Hammer. Mines de l'Orient. Nou- velles Annales des Voyages, tome xxv. p. 376 — 382.
t Bulletin de Pharmacie, tome v. p. 55 — 66 (Février, 1812.) X Eusèbe Salverte. Des Rapports de la Médecine avec la Poli- tique (in- 12. 1806.) We transcribe this passage, with the correc- tions that have been prepared for another edition. The whole work was read in 1804 to the Société Médicale d'Emulation de Paris.
22 TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION.
the blind obedience which they laboured to inspire, since, at the least caprice of the tyrant, they might become the first victims of it? The slaves of both sexes, who figured before the initiated as angels and houris, could not be supposed to prove always discreet. What would become of them, at last, when the progress of years did not permit them to appear in the same parts? Death alone could insure future silence ; and would not the prospect of such a re- ward untie their tongues on the first favourable occasion, or lead them to kill their tormentor when, wandering alone among them, he came to confirm the neophyte in his false persuasion? How, also, would this tribe of actors support themselves? Could their master every day administer to their wants without its being per- ceptible abroad ? In addition, the number of precau- tions to be taken, — the provisions to be renewed, — the frequent necessity of getting rid of these agents, from whose indiscretion there was every thing to be feared, — are all difficulties in the way of our belief in this abominable mystery, much less that it could be main- tained for even three years.
" Besides, it is certain that bodily enjoyments, with whatever ingenuity they may be varied or arrested, have intervals too marked — contrasts too sensible of void and reality — to permit the creation, or the long endurance, of such an illusion. How much more simply is every thing explained, by ascribing the illusions to physical intoxica- tion, combined with the intoxication of the soul ! Among credulous men, previously prepared by the most flattering pictures of Paradise, and promises of future felicity, the
TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION. 23
narcotic potion would easily produce the most pleasurable and desirable sensations, and the magical continuation of themwould render them doubly valuable. ' To speak plain- ly, they can only be regarded as a vision,' says Pasquier,* who, after having examined every thing related by cotem- porary authors on the subject of the Assassins, arrives at that conclusion. Ask a man, in whom a dose of opium has lulled an excruciating pain, to display a picture of the enchanting illusions which he experienced, and the state of ecstacy into which he was plunged for more than twenty-four hours, and they will be found exactly those of the supernatural delights heaped by the chief of the Assassins upon his future Sei'des. We know with what avidity the Easterns, who are accustomed to take opium, give themselves up to its delights, in spite of the ever-growing infirmities which it heaps upon their wretched existence. This eagerness may afford some idea of the pleasures that accompany this species of intoxication, and enable us to comprehend that uncon- trollable desire which may urge an ignorant and super- stitious youth to dare every thing in order to possess, for eternity, such ineffable delights."
The remembrance of the devotion of the disciples of the Old Man of the Mountain to their master, is natu- rally united to that of the constancy with which they endured the most cruel tortures. The intoxication of fanaticism would arm them with this invincible con- stancy : the noble pride of courage, the obstinacy even of a trifling point of honour, would often be sufficient to
* E. Pasquier. Les Recherches de la France, liv. vin. chap. xx. (2 vols, in-fol.) Amsterdam, 1723. tome i. p. 798.
24 TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION.
inspire it. It was, however, much too important to their chief, to be certain that none of them should fail him ; to allow him to rely solely on the power of the recol- lection of the delights that they experienced ; espe- cially when time and distance might reasonably be supposed to weaken their influence. If he was acquainted with the means of allaying bodily feelings, he doubtless took care, also, to provide for the ministers of his ven- geance the same means, in order that they might employ it in a critical moment. The promise of sustaining his followers when under the empire of pain, exalted still more their fanaticism ; and the accomplishment of this promise became a new miracle ; an additional proof of the certain power of him they regarded as the governor of nature. - In advancing this conjecture, we must acknowledge that we cannot support it by any historical proofs.* But is it likely that the Thaumaturgists
* The reasoning of our author is ingenious and very plausible ; but it is not sufficient to overthrow the testimony of Marco Palo, Hanmer, and others respecting the existence of the gardens of the Ismailite Chief at Alamoot. What, we may ask, would the fol- lowers of the Sheikh-al- Jebal, to whom were entrusted his secrets, not suffer rather than divulge them, when we see them laying down their lives in his service every time that he demanded the sacrifice ? These were not acts of obligation, but of a persuasion that obedience to their Chief was to gain them eternal felicity in Paradise after death. Besides, the pains that are taken by all Oriental nations, to confirm the truth of their creeds, cannot be denied; and the secrecy in which their impostures are veiled and pre- served is almost incredible. Thus, in a late communication made to the Royal Asiatic Society, by Sir Claude Wade, on the geogra- phy of the Punjab, we are informed that, in a small but deep lake seven coss from Soohait, named Rawalsir, are seven floating
TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION. 25
would be unacquainted with a secret known to all anti- quity, and especially in Palestine? The Rabbins* inform us, that a drink of wine and strong liquors was given to the unhappy ones condemned to death* and powders were mixed in the liquor, in order to render it stronger, and to deaden the senses. The object of this custom was, no doubt, to reconcile with humanity the intention of exciting alarm by the sight of executions. In the second century of our era, it is related by Apuleius, that a man fortified himself against the violence of blows by a potion containing myrrh.f If, as we think, myrrh could only be drunk in the form of a tincture, the effect of the alcohol must have increased the efficacy of the stupifying drag. We observe everywhere, that this property attri- buted to the myrrh, is not among those for which it is employed in the present day as a medicine. The name
islands, which are objects of worship to Hindoo pilgrims. These votaries proceed to the shores of the lake, address the islands, and present their offerings ; upon which, it is stated, the islands approach the shores, receive the offerings upon their surface, and then retire. " As this tale," adds Sir Claude, " is invariably accredited among the natives, it is not improbable that artificial means are taken to cause tbe islands to traverse the yielding sur- face." a What the nature of this cause is, however, remains an inviolable secret ; although many persons must be employed in working it, and successive cbanges of workmen must be required. This fact, therefore, gives the colouring of truth to all that has been related respecting the gardens at Alamoot. — Ed.
* Tract. Sanhedr. D. Calmet. Commentaire sur le Livre des Pro- verbes, chap. xxxi. verse 6.
t Evang. sec. Marc. cap. xv. verse 25.
a Literary Gazette, n. 1524. p. 317.
26 TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION.
of myrrh, however, might serve to disguise a preparation, the ingredients of which were intended to be kept secret. But in either case, the Old Man of the Mountain could not certainly have been ignorant of a secret which had for so long a time prevailed in Palestine, and which he might also have borrowed from Egypt. The stone of Memphis (lapis memphiticus) was a round body, spark- ling, and about the size of a small pebble ; it was regarded as a natural body. I consider it to have been a work of art. It was ground into powder and laid as an ointment on the parts to which the surgeon was about to apply the knife or the fire.# It preserved the person, without dan- ger, from the pains of the operation ; if taken in a mixture of wine and water, it deadened all feelings of suffering.f A similar secret has existed in all ages in Hindustan. It is probably by such means that the widowsj are pre- served from shrinking from the dread of the blazing pile upon which they place themselves with the dead bodies of their husbands. The eye-witness of one of these sacrifices, that took place in July 1822, saw the victim arrive in a complete state of bodily insensibility, the effect no doubt of the drugs which had been administered to her. Her eyes were open, but she did not appear to see ; and, in a weak voice, and as if mechanically, she answered the legal questions that were put to her regarding the full liberty of her sacrifice. When she was laid on the
* Dioscorid. lib. v. cap. clviii. f Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. xxxvm. cap. vu. X Le P. Paulin de St. Barthélemi. Voyage aux Indes Orientales, tome i. p. 358.
TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION. 27
pile, she was absolutely insensible.* The Christians carried this secret from the east into Europe, on the return of the Crusaders. It was probably known to
* The Asiatic Journal, vol. xv. 1823. p. 292—293. The cus- tom of drugging the Indian widows previous to gaining their consent to this monstrous concremation, is stated to he not unusual, when their relations have any advantage to gain by their decease ; but as many of those who submit to it are of the lower order of women, vanity, and the force of a prevailing super- stition, are the chief inducements. There can be no doubt that this, one of the dominant passions of the sex, frequently impels them to the sacrifice : for women who commit this suicide are canonized after death, and crowds of votaries frequent their shrines, to implore their protection, and to pray for their aid and deliverance from evil.
When this self-sacrifice is by concremation, it is termed Saha- marana ; but occasionally, although rarely, it is performed when the husband is at a distance ; it is then solitary, or Anamarana. The name given to these immolations, by the English in India, is Suttee, a corruption of the word Sati, or pure, the appellation bestowed not upon the sacrifice, but upon the female after she has been purified by the fire. The woman is not, say the Brahmans, destroyed, but only consumed; not annihilated, but merely changed. The tradition of the origin of the custom relates, that the father-in-law of Siva having omitted to invite her to a wed- ding, his wife Paravati felt so offended at this neglect, that in the paroxysm of her rage she flung herself into the fire, and was consumed. She thence became Sati, (transcendent purity), which is also one of her names.
These shameful immolations have been „ attempted to be put down by the Indian Government, but ineffectually ; and, so late as 1825, the number in one year amounted to one hundred and four. When once a woman declares her intention of submitting to concremation with the dead body of her husband, she cannot revoke. The interest of the whole community is at stake as well as her own character ; for if she refuse, it is a prevailing belief that the whole country would be visited with some awful calamity. Every
28 TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION.
the subaltern magicians, as well as that of braving the action of fire, from which I imagine arose the rule of jurisprudence according to which physical insensibility,
effort is therefore employed to inspire her with sacred heroism, and to exalt her imagination to the highest pitch that fanaticism and superstition can impart ; and when these are likely to fail, she is rendered nearly insensible by some narcotic beverage. The sacrifice is preceded by a procession, in which the wretched victim appears decorated with jewels and flowers of the Tulse, or holy Ocymum plant (Ocymum sanctum, Lin.) is borne on a rich palanquin, following a kind of triumphal car, on which the dead body of her husband is seated, also decorated with jewels and costly vestments. When the procession has reached the pile, and the dead body has been laid upon it, the widow is bathed without removing her clothes and jewels, and then re-conducted to the pile, around which she is walked three times, supported by some of her nearest relations. These ceremonies being concluded, she is cast upon the dead body of her husband ; and gee, a species of semi-fluid butter, being poured upon the dry wood, it is instantly fired, and she quickly dies of suffocation before the fire reaches her body.
In examining the accounts of the composure and almost philo- sophical indifference with which these women sacrifice their lives to the prevailing superstition, there is no necessity for believing that it is the sole result of the narcotics administered to them. Woman, in every country and in every age, displays more the character of the sincere devotee than man. Convinced of the truth of the doctrine she embraces, it absorbs her whole mind, her contemplation rests firmly upon it ; and when an hour of trial arrives, she reposes upon its promises in undisturbed tranquillity : all the ties of relationship and of country are forgotten ; every act of memory and consciousness is suppressed ; and under the cir- cumstances, such as have been described as taking place in these concremations, her whole mind turned upon the beatitude she is about to attain, the frailties of our nature are surmounted, and the mortal seems almost already invested with supernatural powers. To the operation of this state of mind, in the opinion of the writer of this note, may we attribute some, at least, of the extraordinary displays of heroism occasionally exhibited in these self-immolations. — En.
TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION. 29
whether partial or general, was a certain sign of sorcery. Many authors quoted by Fromann,* speak of the unhappy sorcerers who have laughed or slept through the agonies of torture ; and they have not failed to add that they were sent to sleep by the power of the devil.
It is also said that the same advantage was enjoyed by pretended sorcerers about the middle of the fifteenth century. Nicholas Eymeric, Grand Inquisitor of Arra- gon, author of the famous Directoire des Inquisiteurs, loudly complained of the sorceries practised by accused persons, through the aid of which, when put to the tor- ture, they appeared absolutely insensible.f Fr. Pegna, who wrote a commentary on Eymeric's work, in 1578, believed also the reality and efficacy of the sorceries. { He strengthens himself by the evidence of the inquisitor Grillandus, and Hippolytus de Marsilies. The latter, who was Professor of Jurisprudence at Bologna in 1524, positively declares, in his ' Pratique Criminelle,' that he has seen the effect of the philters upon the accused persons, who suffered no pain, but appeared to be asleep in the midst of the tortures. The expressions he makes use of are remarkable ; they describe the insensible man, as if plunged into a torpor more like the effect produced by an opiate, than the proud bearing which is the result of a perseverance superior to every pain.
To many instances of this temporary insensibility,
* Fromann. Tract, de Fasc. &;c. pp. 593, 594, and 810, 811.
t Aliqui sunt maleficiati et in quœstionibus malefictis utuntur — efficiuntur enim insensibles. — Direct. Inquisit. Cum. adnot. Fr. Pegnse. (Romse. folio) part in. p. 481.
X Direct. Inquis. &c. p. 483.
30 TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION.
Weirus adds an important observation ; he saw a woman thus inaccessible to the power of torture, her face was black, and her eyes were starting out as if she had been strangled ; her exemption from suffering was due to a species of apoplexy.* A physicianf who witnessed a similar state of insensibility, compares it to fits, epileptic or apoplectic.
A humurous writer, a cotemporary of Francis Pegna, and of J. Wierius, whose name inspires us with little confidence, but who, on this occasion, speaks of what he had seen, and whose place in a tribunal enabled him to know with certainty what occurred,! has also described,with Taboureau, the soporific state which preserved the accused from the sufferings of torture. According to him it was almost useless to put the question. All the jailors were acquainted with the stupifying recipe, and they did not fail to communicate it to the prisoners ; nothing could be easier than to practise it elsewhere, if confidence was reposed in its influence. The secret consisted in swallowing soap dissolved in water.
Common soap does not, certainly, possess the virtues ascribed to it by Taboureau : but does it therefore follow that the principal incident, namely the administration of some potion, is false. I consider it does not ; for this author is not the only person who has stated this fact.
* J. Wierius. De Prœstig. lib. iv. cap. x. p. 520, et seq.
t Fromann. Tract, de Fasc. p. 810, 811.
X Et. Taboureau. Des faux sorciers et leurs impostures (1585). Discourse inserted in the fourth book of the Bigarrures du Sieur des Accords. Et. Taboureau was the King's Counsel at the bailiwick of Dijon.
TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION. 31
On this occasion only, did the possessors of the secret impose on mankind, less to insure to themselves the exclusive possession of it, than to preserve the power of employing it. This becomes credible, if there are sub- stances capable of realizing it ; and how many may we not number that stupify, that suspend, and destroy nervous sensibility. Opium, Henbane, Belladonna, Aconite, Solanum, Stramonium, have been used to deaden pain in surgical operations ; and if they are not now so much prescribed, it is because the stupor they induce endangers the cure, and sometimes the life of the patient. Such a fear would not, however, prevent them from being used by the Brahmans, who conducted the Hindoo widows to the funereal piles of their husbands. It had, however, we perceive, little hold on the dis- ciples of the Old Man of the Mountain, or on the accused who were menaced with torture. Among the substances mentioned, we may distinguish some that were no doubt made use of by the eastern Thauma- turgist; and others so common in Europe, that they might easily have been furnished, as Taboureau states, to the prisoners by the jailers when they were required. Such there are, and from the number of these sub- stances, and the facility of procuring them, we may be permitted to suppose that, known in all ages, they have been, at all times, employed to work apparent miracles. It is not the moderns alone who have wit- nessed the atrocious cruelties, almost above human strength to bear, which before the eyes of a whole nation have been endured by the Hindoo penitents ; — the histo-
32 TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION.
rians of Greece and Rome have spoken of them;* and national traditions state their practise to have existed from the commencement of religious civilization. The patience of man in submitting to them, most probably, has resulted from the cause we have pointed out, namely, the actual use of stupifying drugs : they repeat it often, and this practice, thus prolonged, ends in a perpetual torpor, and renders these fanatics capable of supporting tortures that last their life time. The almost entire destruction of bodily feeling cannot be effected without injuring the mind, and plunging the soul into complete imbecility ; — which is in fact the ruling feature of nearly all these miraculous penitents.
It is also in this state of imbecility that Diodorus represents the Ethiopian savages, whom he describes as being quite insensible to blows, wounds, and the most extraordinary tortures.f A learned man of the seven- teenth century,| supposes that the traveller Simmias, from whom Diodorus copied his narration, had taken as the general character of a nation the temporary state of some individuals intoxicated by a potion similar to the Nepenthes which Homer mentions. It is more probable that Simmias|| met, on the shores of Ethiopia, penitents such as those that exist at the present day in Hindustan ;
* Solinus, cap. lv.
X Diod. Sicul. lib. in. cap. vni.
X Pierre Petit. D. M. Dissertation sur le Nepenthes, 8vo. Utrecht.
|| Simmias was a philosopher of Thebes, but neither he nor Diodorus is high authority : both were extremely credulous ; and both equally ambitious of recording wonders. — Ed.
TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION. 33
and the state in which he saw them had become perma- nent by the continual use of drugs competent to pro- duce it.#
* Hasselquist (Voyage dans le Levant, 1st part, p. 257), observes, that opium habitually taken in excess by the dervises, conduces to complete stupidity.
The torments which the Yogis, or Indian penitents, impose upon themselves, are not borne by the individual becoming insen- sible through the influence of stupifying drugs, but they are truly the result, either of an ambition to become worthy of eternal bliss, or a slavish obedience to vanity, that they may enjoy in this world the respect of the noble and the great, and the admiration of the unthinking multitude. A Yogis will stand in a certain position for years ; sometimes with his hands above his head, until the arms wither, and become incapable of action ; others keep the hands closed until the nails pierce through their palms ; some double themselves up like a hedgehog, and thus are rolled along from the Indus to the banks of the Ganges ; or suspend themselves by the heels over the fiercest fires, or sit in the centre of many fires, throwing combustibles into them to increase the flames. - These, and a thousand other tortures which they brave, are not all the result of trick, aided by stupifying drugs, as our author asserts, but the effects of an absurd, superstitious credulity, that those acts are to gain for them eternal felicity. That many of them are sincere, is demonstrated in their belief that even tigers will respect them ; will come voluntarily to them ; and lie down, and fondle and lick their hands ; a belief which sometimes costs them their lives. Upon what other plea can we account for the suicides that are perpetrated at the temple of Juggernaut, and at the sacred spot where the Ganges and the Jumna mingle their waters ; and the disgust- ing abominations that nothing but a sincere belief in their efficacy could have admitted into several of their religious ceremonies. That many penitents perish by tigers every year ; but nevertheless that numbers of these penitents are imposters, there is little doubt. Their putting to death and resuscitating a human victim, or what is termed pahvadam, is undoubtedly a mere counterfeit rite to impose upon the ignorant and extort charity from the rich ; and many others of their VOL. II. D
34 TYRANNY OF SUPERSTITION.
exhibitions are intended for the same purpose. This does not, how- ever, weaken our argument in favour of the. extreme length to which a desire to confirm extraordinary doctrines will carry enthusiasts. Without going to Hindustan, we may find in Europe sufficient evidence of this fact ; but the mention of one only will suffice to demonstrate the temper of the period when such proofs could be demanded or believed. When Antioch was taken by the Chris- tians, in the eleventh century, the identity of the lance which was reputed to have pierced the side of our Saviour was disputed. The monk who had recently made the discovery, by the sugges- tion of a vision, offered to undergo the ordeal of fire to establish the truth of what he said. His offer was accepted, and he passed through the terrible proof. He died, however, within a few days, and the fact of the supposed discovery became problematical.8 —Ed.
a Berrington's Literary History of the Middle Ages, 4to. 1814, p. 265.
INFLUENCE OF PERFUMES IN SORCERY. 35