Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 35.djvu/168

154 to the priest, suffering terribly with all the usual evidences of diabolic possession. The priest was besought to cast out the devil, but he simply took her to the hospital, where, under scientific treatment, she rapidly became better.

The final triumph of science in this part of the great field has been mainly achieved during the latter half of the present century.

Following in the noble succession of Paracelsus and John Hunter and Pinel and Tuke and Esquirol, have come a band of thinkers and workers who have evolved out of the earlier forms of truths new growths, ever more and more precious.

Among the many facts and principles thus brought to bear upon this last stronghold of the Prince of Darkness, may be named especially those of "expectant attention," an expectation of phenomena dwelt upon until the longing for them becomes morbid and invincible, and the creation of them perhaps unconscious. Still another class of phenomena are found to arise from a morbid tendency to imitation which leads to epidemics. Still another group has been brought under hypnotism. Multitudes more have been found under the innumerable forms and results of hysteria. A study of the effects of the imagination upon bodily function has also yielded remarkable results.

And, finally, to supplement this work, have come in an array of scholars in history and literature who have investigated myth making and wonder-mongering.

Thus has been cleared away that cloud of supernaturalism which so long hung over mental diseases, and thus have they been brought within the firm grasp of science.