influence over these unfortunates.[8] A thousand singular
incidents were related in connection with his cures, in which the
credulity of the time gave itself full scope. But still these
difficulties must not be exaggerated. The disorders which were
explained by "possessions" were often very slight. In our times, in
Syria, they regard as mad or possessed by a demon (these two ideas
were expressed by the same word, _medjnoun_[9]) people who are only
somewhat eccentric. A gentle word often suffices in such cases to
drive away the demon. Such were doubtless the means employed by Jesus.
Who knows if his celebrity as exorcist was not spread almost without
his own knowledge? Persons who reside in the East are occasionally
surprised to find themselves, after some time, in possession of a
great reputation, as doctors, sorcerers, or discoverers of treasures,
without being able to account to themselves for the facts which have
given rise to these strange fancies.

[Footnote 1: _Vendidad_, xi. 26; _Yacna_, x. 18.]

[Footnote 2: _Tobit_, iii. 8, vi. 14; Talm. of Bab., _Gittin_, 68
_a_.]

[Footnote 3: Comp. Mark xvi. 9; Luke viii. 2; _Gospel of the Infancy_,
16, 33; Syrian Code, published in the _Anecdota Syriaca_ of M. Land,
i., p. 152.]

[Footnote 4: Jos., _Bell. Jud._, VII. vi. 3; Lucian, _Philopseud._,
16; Philostratus, _Life of Apoll._, iii. 38, iv. 20; Aretus, _De
causis morb. chron._, i. 4.]

[Footnote 5: Matt. ix. 33, xii. 22; Mark ix. 16, 24; Luke xi. 14.]

[Footnote 6: _Tobit_, viii. 2, 3; Matt. xii. 27; Mark ix. 38; _Acts_
xix. 13; Josephus, _Ant._, VIII. ii. 5; Justin, _Dial. cum Tryph._,
85; Lucian, Epigr., xxiii. (xvii. Dindorf).]

[Footnote 7: Matt. xvii. 20; Mark ix. 24, and following.]

[Footnote 8: Matt. viii. 28, ix. 34, xii. 43, and following, xvii. 14,
and following, 20; Mark v. 1, and following; Luke viii. 27, and
following.]

[Footnote 9: The phrase, _Daemonium habes_ (Matt. xi. 18: Luke vii. 33;
John vii. 20, viii. 48, and following, x. 20, and following) should be
translated by: "Thou art mad," as we should say in Arabic: _Medjnoun
ente_. The verb [Greek: daimonan] has also, in all classical
antiquity, the meaning of "to be mad."]

Many circumstances, moreover, seem to indicate that Jesus only became
a thaumaturgus late in life and against his inclination. He often
performs his miracles only after he has been besought to do so, and
with a degree of reluctance, reproaching those who asked them fo