Daily national Democrat., 1860-06-20

| oughly convinced the civilized world of tn
non existence of spirits, and had gone fai
also, towards very grossly Undertaking. tn
conceptions of men, when modern spiritual
ism broke forth and confounded the savan
as well as the masses. The laws of mesmei
ism, electricity, and what not, have beer
brought to bear TO explain the phenomena
a portion has been explained and may l.
safely attributed to physical causes; bu
there are other portions which yet remain Il
be satisfactorily accounted for. No doub
they will be accounted for. ere the world i
much Older and We leave the mystery wher,
we find it, content to wait until the solution
comes if it comes at ALL
1t is curious to ransack the musty old tome
Of the Past, in the investigation OF this sub
jeet, and to observe what strange credulity
possessed the minds of even the foremos
men and the foremost nations of the world
The most industrious compiler of ghost
stories, and the stories of demons, wizard:
and witches. that ever existed, was old King
many years of his life to writing book on
these wonderful things, and he tells, with an
air Of solemnty overpoweringly ridiculous,
the most incredible of circumstances and
ev snts. We wish that we had space to re-
count some of his serious but irresistably
laughable variations. Had he taken half
the pains in properly governing his kingdom
chat he did in writing his book on witch
craft, England might possibly have been,
under his reign, something more than she
was, II second rate power
One of the strangest of all the phases of
mems belief in iends and demons occurs to
Us. just at this time 1t was belief in the
inea5i and the Suecuba 1t existed in various
parts of the civilized world, but prevailed in
its full fury in France, during considerable
portion of the Middle Ages. The iacu6i
were male demons who assaied the chastity
of females, married and unmarried, under
the cover of night, aud eompassed their i'm
pure purposes either by force Or a supernat-
ural influence which subdued the will The
succabG were female demons who visited
boys ruined them in a similar manner
AS absurd as this belief seems, in the pres
ent age, it was extensively entertained in the
times to which we alluae. The gravest Ec.
clesastics OF the period considered the sub
ject in solemn conclave, and Pope Innocent
VII issued bull on the sul jeet, $50 history
says) containing formula 10y which the
ineubi and the succubG might be exercised.
Very few boys confessed to having been thus
seduced, but the females who complained of
the incubj were numerous, and many of them
gave very visible evidence of the partial
truth at least of their declarations. Some
of them were married females, and seemed
to be greatly tortured at the idea of their
unfortunate thradom. AT last, in 1887, it
was settled, 10y grand discussion, in pub
lie and solemn manner "a discussion at which
the loftiest ladies in the land and the bright
est intellects of the country were present
that it was not likely that incubi and accu
ba existed but, if they did exist, they were
not capable Of procreation, and consequently
that humanity would not be visibly marred
10y their visitations Still, great many of
the common people, and some not quite so
common, continued to believe that the incubi
and saccube not only existed but that they
propagated their species, and, consequently
that men and women walked the earth who
were nothing more nor less than half demons
(For that matter, there are men and omen
of the present time whom we might we'll des.
! ignate as whole demons, without regard tC
the question of either imcubi or succuJa)
We have not space or time to notice tn,
many curious fancies Of mankind, regarding
the supernatural; but the old books, whicl
treat OF the subject, may be obtained by thos,
who care to take the pains to inquire fol
them. You may find for instance, the his
tory OF some remarkably strange things
(such as the meetings Of the witches, in tn,
woods of France and of Germany, where tn,
most degrading debaucheries were commit
ted the common people believing that tn
persons engaged in them were sold to Satan.
which happened during the fourteenth, fiji
teenth and sixteenth centuries See Bodin'
Demonomane the Eccleastical History Q
Henry XVII, and the writer's of the times O
Francis |. After reading such narrations a
these, we can well make allowances for tn
far less extravagant superstitions of the ex
listing age.