I. First, In confidering what the Holy s ER M. Scriptures have delivered to us concerning this XVI. Point; I fhall confine myself chiefly to the New Teftament. Not but there is a Case recorded in the Old Teftament, which will come in my Way before I conclude: But I shall build on no Authorities but what I can draw from the New: At the Head of which, I place the Paffage I have taken for my Text: There came to Jefus, a certain Man, kneeling down to him, and faying, Lord have Mercy on my Son; for he is lunatick and fore vexed: i. e. grievously afflicted at certain Seasons, and Changes of the Moon, with an Epilepfy, or Falling Sickness; for he oft-times falleth into the Fire, and oft into the Water. Now that this, though a Lunacy to outward Appearance, was yet the Effect of fome wicked Spirit's Poffeffion, appears from the 18th Verfe; where we are told, that Jefus rebuked the Devil, and he departed out of him, infomuch, that the Child was cured from that very Hour. Accordingly, the other Evangelifts, that relate this Miracle, tell us it was a dumb Spirit that had feized him, and that wherefoever it took him, he fuddenly cried out, and the Devil tore him and bruised him, that he foamed again, and gnashed with his Teeth, and pined away ;

and

SERM, and that it oft-times caft him into the Fire,

XVI. and into the Waters to deftroy him; Mark ix.

·

17, &c. and Luke ix. 38, &c. These were all Symptoms of what we call a black, fullen, melancholy Madness; and of one who, in his Fits, was weary of Life, and watchful of Opportunities to put an End to it by Violence: And yet all the Reporters of the Story tell us, that it was the Effect of a malignant Spirit, of a dumb and deaf Spirit, as our Blessed Lord himself pronounces him to be: Thou dumb and deaf Spirit, (faith he) i. e. thou wicked Spirit, that caufeft this Man to be dumb, and fullenly filent, and mute to every thing that is afked him, and deaf to, and regardless of every thing that is faid to him, I charge thee, come out of him, and enter no more into him; Mark ix. 25-27. At the Word of Command the Devil left him, but left him like a Devil, doing him all the Mischief he could in parting from him. For he cried and rent him fore, and came out of him: And he was as one dead; infomuch that many faid, he is dead. But the compaffionate Jefus took him by the Hand, and lifted him up, and healed the Child, and delivered him again to his Father; Luke ix. 42. This is not the Manner of the going off of a meer natural Disease, but the Treat

ment

ment of a hellish, invidious Spirit. And yet S ER M. the Child is called a Lunatick, and the Symp- XVI. toms of Lunacy, accompanied the Poffeffion.

And just so in another Instance, which I shall now produce, the Symptoms of a raving or furious Madness (which the Greeks call Mania) accompanied the Poffeffion of the Man who had his Dwelling among the Tombs: Who, to outward Appearance, and in Reality too, was as truly a Madman, as any that Bedlam now can fhew; unruly and fierce, so that no Man would venture to pass by that Way; strong and ungovernable, fo that no Man could bind him, no, not with Chains; for his Chains he plucked afunder, and broke his Fetters in Pieces; nor could any one tame him. But be was always, Night and Day, in the Mountains, and in the Tombs, wearing no Clothes, but crying, and cutting himself with Stones. Here, as I observed, are all the Signs of a raving Madness: And yet the facred History affures us, that this again was the Effect of many Devils, that had entered into him; so many as to call themselves Legion, or a Regiment; Matt. viii. 28, &c. Mark v. I, &c. Luke viii. 27, &c.

And that this Relation was according to Reality and Fact, and not adapted to an OVOL. III. pinion

Cc

SERM. pinion only, that prevailed at that Time aXVI. mong the Jews, appears from the Sequel of

the Relation: From whence we learn, not only, that the Man that had the Madness was brought to his right Mind; but also that the Devils, who had caufed his Madness, did, upon leaving him, with our Saviour's Permiffion, enter into a Herd of Swine, poffeffing them with the fame Madness and Rage, so that, though they were in Number about two thoufand, they all ran violently down a steep Place into the Sea, and perished in the Waters. From these two Inftances it fufficiently appears, that the Demoniacks, or Perfons difpoffeffed by our Lord, whether melancholily, or ravingly, were certainly mad, and that their Madness was occafioned by fome Impreffions upon their Brain from wicked Spirits. But that you may not depend, on fo, unufual a Topick, upon my own Judgment fingly, I fhall proceed in the,

II. Second Place, to give you the Opinion of the antient Jews and Gentiles, and of the Primitive Chriftian Fathers on the Point. The Opinion of the Jews we may easily come at from the fame holy Writers, the Evangelifts themselves, from whom I have al

ready

ready ftated the Cafe. The Man who cames ER M. to our Saviour with his Son, who is the Sub- XVI. ject of my Text, though, according to St Matthew, he calls him a Lunatick; yet St Mark, and St Luke tell us, he imputed that Distemper or Lunacy to the Seizure of a Spirit, even before our Lord had fhewn that it was fo, by cafting one out of him: A plain Evidence that, in his Father's Opinion, to be a Lunatick, and a Demoniack, was the fame Thing. Nor was it the Opinion of a single Man only, but of the Jews in general *: For in the Diversity of their Opinions concerning Christ, we are told that Many of them said, He hath a Devil and is mad, John x. 20. which Expreffion, however blasphemous and fhocking, plainly spoke it to be their Notion, that Poffeffion and Madness differed no otherwife, than as a Cause from the Effect: The Man was poffeffed, they thought, and therefore he was mad. For which Reason, whenever our Bleffed Lord talked, as they thought, inconfiftently and strangely, it was usual for the Jews to tell him, that he had a Devil; John vii. 20. viii. 48, 52. meaning, that he talked like a Madman. And fo because, John the Baptift came neither eating Bread,

*See LIGHTFOOT on Matth. xvii. 15.