Emanuel Deutsch, although, in a passage already
cited, recognising the religious significance attached to epilepsy, has the following curious comment:—
"Mohammed was epileptic; and vast ingenuity and medical knowledge have been lavished upon this point as explanatory of Mohammed's mission and success. We, for our own part, do not think that epilepsy ever made a man appear a prophet to himself or even to the people of the East; or, for the matter of that, inspired him with the like heart-moving words and glorious pictures. Quite the contrary. It was taken as a sign of demons within—demons, 'Devs,' devils to whom all manner of diseases were ascribed throughout the antique world."
This seems very largely to miss the point at issue. Of course, no one would claim that Mohammed's success was due to epilepsy, or even that the very severe forms of epilepsy were favourable to inducing a conviction of revelation. But the disease assumes various forms, and in some cases it is expressed in the form of a period of mental excitement and general irritability. All that is claimed is that, given the complaint in its less severe forms in one with whom religious beliefs are strong, there are present all the conditions for attributing the resulting hallucinations to personal revelation or ecstatic vision. And it is also true that while some patients after emerging from a fit of epilepsy are in a dazed or confused condition, others have a very clear recollection of all they have seen and heard. Mohammed simply took the current explanation of cases of nervous derangement, and being a man of strong religious feeling, naturally gave his visions a religious interpretation. All the rest has to be
explained in terms of the innate genius of the man and of the circumstances of his time.
A similar case to the above is that of Emanuel Swedenborg. His followers naturally resent the ascription of his visions and voices to a pathologic origin, and point to his pronounced mental ability. And certainly no one who is at all acquainted with the writings of Swedenborg will question his great mental power, amounting at times to positive genius. But here, again, we have strong religious conviction in alliance with pathological conditions. Swedenborg's communications with celestial beings were of a more frequent and more ordered character than Mohammed's, but there is the same general likeness between them. Of his first revelation he writes:—
"At ten o'clock I lay down in bed and was somewhat better; half an hour after I heard a clamour under my head; I thought that then the tempter went away; immediately there came over me a rigor so strong from the head and the whole body, with some din, and this several times. I found that something holy was over me. I thereupon fell asleep, and at about twelve, one, or two o'clock in the night there came over me so strong a shivering from head to foot, as if many winds rushed together, which shook me, was indescribable, and prostrated me upon my face. Then, while I was prostrated, I was in a moment quite awake, and saw that I was cast down, and wondered what it meant. And I spoke as if I was awake, but found that the word was put into my mouth, and I said, 'Omnipotent Jesus Christ, as of Thy great grace Thou condescendest to come to so great a sinner, make me worthy of this grace!' I held my hands together and prayed,
and then came a hand which squeezed my hands hard; immediately thereupon I continued in prayer."[57]
Swedenborg confessed to repeated walks and talks with celestial visitants, and, of course, all thought of imposture must be put on one side. What one has to consider is whether we are to accept these experiences as hallucinations or not. On the one side no further evidence seems possible than the profound faith of the man himself, his recognised mental ability, and the belief of his followers. And against this it must be urged that the most complete honesty is no guarantee against self-deception, while ability and even genius are not at all incompatible with a pathologic strain. And in addition it must be borne in mind that these hallucinations are, after all, part of a very large class. Men of very little ability and influence experience substantially the same visions; they occur all over the world, under all conditions of culture, and always express the personal idiosyncrasies of the subject and reflect the character of his social environment. One may safely say that had Swedenborg lived a century later, while he might still have gone through the same mental and physical experiences, he himself would have given a very different interpretation of them.
St. Paul, Professor James points out, "certainly had once an epileptoid, if not an epileptic seizure." One needs to add to this that the seizure occurred at the one critical moment of his life which eventuated in his conversion from Judaism to Christianity. Mary Magdalene, the first who brought tidings of the resurrection,