Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1878-04-04
PrfestIy Magic.

Darkness being almost as essential
to these ancient media as to most
modern ones-when from the conse-
Grated stone, as Pliny says. "the gods
arose" in the blue wreaths of the
burning incense, or when a phantas~
magorial procession of the heather
dellies passed athwart clouds OF dust
or smoke, the phenomena" were due
to the priestly students of nature, who
must have used some argument of
concave mirrors and lenses by which
images of solid bodies and pictures
could be thrown upon such cloud-cur-
tains. When the vivid lights and the
enchanting scenery faded to black
night-in which, by the lightning's
flash, were presented forms to make
the stoutest tremble-and the music
Of flutes, of trumpets, and of cymbals
was drowned in thunder artifcially
produced and rambling in solemn
tones along the labyrinthine passages
OF the sacred caverns, and the earth
would seem to tremble and yawn, the
effect was merely an artlfice of the
priests further to impress the minds
OF their victims. A slight knowledge
of mechanics would enable them to
raise and depress the flooring of the
cave, and that the priests adopted de-
vices to this end has been proved by
an examination of the Temple of Ce-
res at Eleusis, where the floor was
found to be much below the level of
the portico. Afterwards grooves
were discovered in the walls in which
a false wooden floor might move up
and down; and there were marble
blocks at certain intervals, each con.
tanning holes at various heights for
the wedges that fixed the flooring in
its place.
When Apollonius of Tyrana, ssthe
true friend OF the gods," il not always
the truthful one, visited India, and the
sages there struck the grounds in the
temples of the gods with their magic
wands, he who had been initiated at
Athens into the + . lsInian mysteries
we'll knew that signal to the stalwart
arms below would set the floor upon
which he stood heaving like the deck
of chip. When the Temple of Sc
rapis at Alexandria was destroyed by
order of Theodosius, it was found full
OF secret passages, and of machinery
to aid in the impostures of the priests !;
and when those willy Egyptian retail
ers of the supernatural Wanted that
their lamps would burn "forever,"
they omitted one important fact, that
from these were laid secret pipes lead
ing TO bituminous wells, and the lamps
having asbestos wicks, which are in.
combustible, but would raise the oil,
they might almost be said to be in a
fair way to burn eternally.
DIR. Rudolph Tangsky, physician of
the Mount Sinai Hospital at New
York, thus discourses of the miracle
cure claimed to have been performed
by the Mauch Chunk, Pa, Catholic
priest: "The whole story is based
upon delusion and the ignorance of
those who claim to have seen the mi
raculous cure. The lady in question
has probably been suffering from
what we physicians would term case
of bysteria, in which frequent hemorr-
hayes from the lungs sometimes do
occur, and spasms are very often no
ticed as one of the symptoms of this
disease. ! have myself seen at least
. dozen similar eases, when sponta-
neous cure followed without the in
rervention of a guardian angel, bat
simply as sequel of the laws of ma
ture, nothing more nor less. In this
enlightened country hope there win
be none to believe the ridiculous
story referred to. which might do to
frigbten little children with, but oan-
not be believed by any one in the
possession Of his right senses. - The
New York Evangelist,