The Phantom World Part 55

The Life of St. Fursius,[634] written a short time after his death, which happened about the year 653, reports several visions seen by this holy man. Being grievously ill, and unable to stir, he saw himself in the midst of the darkness raised up, as it were, by the hands of three angels, who carried him out of the world, then brought him back to it, and made his soul re-enter his body, to complete the destination a.s.signed him by G.o.d. Then he found himself in the midst of several people, who wept for him as if he were dead, and told him how, the day before, he had fallen down in a swoon, so that they believed him to be dead. He could have wished to have some intelligent persons about him to relate to them what he had seen; but having no one near him but rustics, he asked for and received the communion of the body and blood of the Saviour, and continued three days longer awake.

The following Tuesday, he fell into a similar swoon, in the middle of the night; his feet became cold, and raising his hands to pray, he received death with joy. Then he saw the same three angels descend who had already guided him. They raised him as the first time, but instead of the agreeable and melodious songs which he had then heard, he could now hear only the frightful howlings of the demons, who began to fight against him, and shoot inflamed darts at him. The Angel of the Lord received them on his buckler, and extinguished them. The devil reproached Fursius with some bad thoughts, and some human weaknesses, but the angels defended him, saying, "If he has not committed any capital sins, he shall not perish."

As the devil could not reproach him with anything that was worthy of eternal death, he saw two saints from his own country--St. Bean and St. Medan, who comforted him and announced to him the evils with which G.o.d would punish mankind, princ.i.p.ally because of the sins of the doctors or learned men of the church, and the princes who governed the people;--the doctors for neglecting to declare the word of G.o.d, and the princes for the bad examples they gave their people. After which, they sent him back into his body again. He returned into it with repugnance, and began to relate all that he had seen; they poured spring water upon his body, and he felt a great warmth between his shoulders. After this, he began to preach throughout Hibernia; and the Venerable Bede[635] says that there was in his monastery an aged monk who said that he had learned from a grave personage well worthy of belief, that he had heard these visions described by St. Fursius himself. This saint had not the least doubt that his soul was really separated from his body, when he was carried away in his trance.

Footnotes:

[634] Vita Sti. Fursci, apud Bolland. 16 Januarii, pp. 37, 38. Item, pp. 47, 48. Saecul. xi. Bened. p. 299.

[635] Bede, lib. iii. Hist. c. 19.

CHAPTER LVIII.

VISION OF A PROTESTANT OF YORK, AND OTHERS.

Here is another instance, which happened in 1698 to one of the so-called reformed religion.[636] A minister of the county of York, at a place called Hipley, and whose name was Henry Vatz (Watts), being struck with apoplexy the 15th of August, was on the 17th placed in a coffin to be buried. But as they were about to put him in the grave, he uttered a loud cry, which frightened all the persons who had attended him to the grave; they took him quickly out of the coffin, and as soon as he had come to himself, he related several surprising things which he said had been revealed to him during his trance, which had lasted eight-and-forty hours. The 24th of the same month, he preached a very moving discourse to those who had accompanied him the day they were carrying him to the tomb.

People may, if they please, treat all that we have related as dreams and tales, but it cannot be denied that we recognize in these resurrections, and in these narrations of men who have come to life again after their real or seeming death, the belief of the church concerning h.e.l.l, paradise, purgatory, the efficacy of prayers for the dead, and the apparitions of angels and demons who torment the d.a.m.ned, and of the souls who have yet something to expiate in the other world.

We see also, that which has a visible connection with the matter we are treating upon--persons really dead, and others regarded as such, who return to life in health and live a long time afterwards. Lastly, we may observe therein opinions on the state of souls after this life, which are nearly the same as among the Hebrews, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, barbarous nations, and Christians. If the Hungarian ghosts do not speak of what they have seen in the other world, it is either that they are not really dead, or more likely that all which is related of these _revenans_ is fabulous and chimerical. I will add some more instances which will serve to confirm the belief of the primitive church on the subject of apparitions.

St. Perpetua, who suffered martyrdom in Africa in 202 or 203, being in prison for the faith, saw a brother named Dinocrates, who had died at the age of seven years of a cancer in the cheek; she saw him as if in a very large dungeon, so that they could not approach each other. He seemed to be placed in a reservoir of water, the sides of which were higher than himself, so that he could not reach the water, for which he appeared to thirst very much. Perpetua was much moved at this, and prayed to G.o.d with tears and groans for his relief. Some days after, she saw in spirit the same Dinocrates, well clothed, washed, and refreshed, and the water of the reservoir in which he was, only came up to his middle, and on the edge a cup, from which he drank, without the water diminishing, and the skin of the cancer in his cheek well healed, so that nothing now remained of the cancer but the scar. By these things she understood that Dinocrates was no longer in pain.

Dinocrates was there apparently[637] to expiate some faults which he had committed since his baptism, for Perpetua says a little before this that only her father had remained in infidelity.

The same St. Perpetua, being in prison some days before she suffered martyrdom[638] had a vision of the deacon Pomponius, who had suffered martyrdom some days before, and who said to her, "Come, we are waiting for you." He led her through a rugged and winding path into the arena of the amphitheatre, where she had to combat with a very ugly Egyptian, accompanied by some other men like him. Perpetua found herself changed into a man, and began to fight naked, a.s.sisted by some well-made youths who came to her service and a.s.sistance.

Then she beheld a man of extraordinary size, who cried aloud, "If the Egyptian gains the victory over her, he will kill her with his sword; but if she conquers, she shall have this branch ornamented with golden apples for her reward." Perpetua began the combat, and having overthrown the Egyptian, trampled his head under her feet. The people shouted victory, and Perpetua approaching him who held the branch above mentioned, he put it in her hands, and said to her, "Peace be with you." Then she awoke, and understood that she would have to combat, not against wild beasts, but against the devil.

Saturus, one of the companions of the martyrdom of St. Perpetua, had also a vision, which he relates thus: "We had suffered martyrdom, and were disengaged from this mortal body. Four angels carried us towards the East without touching us. We arrived at a place shining with intense l.u.s.tre; Perpetua was at my side, and I said unto her, 'Behold what the Lord promised us.'

"We entered a large garden full of trees and flowers; the four angels who had borne us thither placed us in the hands of other angels, who conducted us by a wide road to a place where we found Jocondus, Saturninus, and Artazes, who had suffered with us, and invited us to come and salute the Lord. We followed them, and beheld in the midst of this place the Almighty, crowned with dazzling light, and we heard repeated incessantly by those around him, Holy! holy! holy! They raised us towards him, and we stopped before his throne. We gave him the kiss of peace, and he stroked our faces with his hand.

"We came out, and we saw before the door the bishop Optatus and the priest Aspasius, who threw themselves at our feet. We raised and embraced them. We recognized in this place several of our brethren and some martyrs." Such was the vision of Saturus.

There are visions of all sorts; of holy martyrs, and of holy angels.

It is related of St. Exuperus, bishop of Thoulouse,[639] that having conceived the design of transporting the relics of St. Saturnus, a former bishop of that church, to place them in a new church built in his honor, he could with difficulty resolve to take this holy body from the tomb, fearing to displease the saint, or to diminish the honor which was due to him. But while in this doubt, he had a vision which gave him to understand that this translation would neither lessen the respect which was due to the ashes of the martyr, nor be prejudicial to his honor; but that on the contrary it would contribute to the salvation of the faithful, and to the greater glorification of G.o.d.

Some days before[640] St. Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, suffered martyrdom, in 258, he had a vision, not being as yet quite asleep, in which a young man whose height was extraordinary, seemed to lead him to the Praetorium before the Proconsul, who was seated on his tribunal.

This magistrate, having caught sight of Cyprian, began to write his sentence before he had interrogated him as was usual. Cyprian knew not what the sentence condemned him to; but the young man above mentioned, and who was behind the judge, made a sign by opening his hand and spreading in form of a sword, that he was condemned to have his head cut off.

Cyprian easily understood what was meant by this sign, and having earnestly requested to be allowed a day's delay to put his affairs in order, the judge, having granted his request, again wrote upon his tablets, and the young man by a sign of his hand let him know that the delay was granted. These predictions were exactly fulfilled, and we see many similar ones in the works of St. Cyprian.

St. Fructueux, Bishop of Tarragona,[641] who suffered martyrdom in 259, was seen after his death ascending to heaven with the deacons who had suffered with him; they appeared as if they were still attached to the stakes near which they had been burnt. They were seen by two Christians, who showed them to the wife and daughter of Emilian, who had condemned them. The saint appeared to Emilian himself and to the Christians, who had taken away their ashes, and desired that they might be all collected in one spot. We see similar apparitions[642] in the acts of St. James, of St. Marienus, martyrs, and some others who suffered in Numidia in 259. We may observe the like[643] in the acts of St. Monta.n.u.s, St. Lucius, and other African martyrs in 259 or 260, and in those of St. Vincent, a martyr in Spain, in 304, and in the life of St. Theodore, martyr, in 306, of whose sufferings St. Gregory of Nicea has written an account. Everybody knows what happened at Sebastus, in Armenia, in the martyrdom of the famous forty martyrs, of whom St. Basil the Great has written the eulogium. One of the forty, overcome by the excess of cold, which was extreme, threw himself into a hot bath that was prepared just by. Then he who guarded them having perceived some angels who brought crowns to the thirty-nine who had persevered in their sufferings, despoiled himself of his garments, joined himself to the martyrs, and declared himself a Christian.

All these instances invincibly prove that, at least in the first ages of the church, the greatest and most learned bishops, the holy martyrs, and the generality of the faithful, were well persuaded of the possibility and reality of apparitions.

Footnotes:

[636] Larrey, Hist. de Louis XIV. year 1698, p. 68.

[637] Aug. lib. i. de Origine Animae.

[638] Ibid. p. 97.

[639] Aug. lib. i. de Origine Animae, p. 132.

[640] Acta Martyr. Sincera, p. 212. Vita et Pa.s.sio S. Cypriani, p.

268.

[641] Acta Martyr. Sincera, pp. 219, 221.

[642] Acta Martyr. Sincera, p. 226.

[643] Ibid. pp. 231-233, 237.

CHAPTER LIX.

CONCLUSIONS OF THIS DISSERTATION.

To resume, in a few words, all that we have related in this dissertation: we have therein shown that a resurrection, properly so called, of a person who has been dead for a considerable time, and whose body was either corrupted, or stinking, or ready to putrefy, like that of Pierre, who had been three years buried, and was resuscitated by St. Stanislaus, or that of Lazarus, who had been four days in the tomb, and already possessing a corpse-like smell--such a resurrection can be the work of the almighty power of G.o.d alone.

That persons who have been drowned, fallen into syncope, into a lethargy or trance, or looked upon as dead, in any manner whatever, can be cured and brought back to life, even to their former state of life, without any miracle, but by the power of medicine alone, or by natural efforts, or by dint of patience; so that nature re-establishes herself in her former state, that the heart resumes its pulsation, and the blood circulates freely again in the arteries, and the vital and animal spirits in the nerves.

That the oupires, or vampires, or _revenans_ of Moravia, Hungary, Poland, &c., of which such extraordinary things are related, so detailed, so circ.u.mstantial, invested with all the necessary formalities to make them believed, and to prove them even judicially before judges, and at the most exact and severe tribunals; that all which is said of their return to life; of their apparition, and the confusion which they cause in the towns and country places; of their killing people by sucking their blood, or in making a sign to them to follow them; that all those things are mere illusions, and the consequence of a heated and prejudiced imagination. They cannot cite any witness who is sensible, grave and unprejudiced, who can testify that he has seen, touched, interrogated these ghosts, who can affirm the reality of their return, and of the effects which are attributed to them.

I shall not deny that some persons may have died of fright, imagining that their near relatives called them to the tomb; that others have thought they heard some one rap at their doors, worry them, disturb them, in a word, occasion them mortal maladies; and that these persons judicially interrogated, have replied that they had seen and heard what their panic-struck imagination had represented to them. But I require unprejudiced witnesses, free from terror and disinterested, quite calm, who can affirm upon serious reflection, that they have seen, heard, and interrogated these vampires, and who have been the witnesses of their operations; and I am persuaded that no such witness will be found.

I have by me a letter, which has been sent me from Warsaw, the 3d of February, 1745, by M. Slivisk, visitor of the province of priests of the mission of Poland. He sends me word, that having studied with great care this matter, and having proposed to compose on this subject a theological and physical dissertation, he had collected some memoirs with that view; but that the occupations of visitor and superior in the house of his congregation of Warsaw, had not allowed of his putting his project in execution; that he has since sought in vain for these memoirs or notes, which have probably remained in the hands of some of those to whom he had communicated them; that amongst these notes were two resolutions of the Sorbonne, which both forbade cutting off the head and maiming the body of any of these pretended oupires or vampires. He adds, that these decisions may be found in the registers of the Sorbonne, from the year 1700 to 1710. I shall report by and by, a decision of the Sorbonne on this subject, dated in the year 1691.

He says, moreover, that in Poland they are so persuaded of the existence of these oupires, that any one who thought otherwise would be regarded almost as a heretic. There are several facts concerning this matter, which are looked upon as incontestable, and many persons are named as witnesses of them. "I gave myself the trouble," says he, "to go to the fountain-head, and examine those who are cited as ocular witnesses." He found that no one dared to affirm that they had really seen the circ.u.mstances in question, and that it was all merely reveries and fancies, caused by fear and unfounded discourse. So writes to me this wise and judicious priest.

I have also received since, another letter from Vienna in Austria, written the 3d of August, 1746, by a Lorraine baron,[644] who has always followed his prince. He tells me, that in 1742, his imperial majesty, then his royal highness of Lorraine, had several verbal acts drawn up concerning these cases, which happened in Moravia. I have them by me still; I have read them over and over again; and to be frank, I have not found in them the shadow of truth, nor even of probability, in what is advanced. They are, nevertheless, doc.u.ments which in that country are looked upon as true as the Gospel.

Footnotes:

[644] M. le Baron Toussaint.