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Exorcism in the Age of Reason

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A History of Exorcism in Catholic Christianity

Part of the book series: Palgrave Historical Studies in Witchcraft and Magic ((PHSWM))

Abstract

In the eighteenth century, attitudes to exorcism divided the Catholic world. This division broadly followed a philosophical division within Catholic Christendom between adherence to a conservative interpretation of Neo-Scholastic Aristotelianism and openness to Enlightenment thought. Spain and its territories were the heartland of the conservative tradition, while France was the centre of a ‘Catholic’ Enlightenment that pushed the boundaries of orthodoxy. Rome, caught between the ‘superstitious’ practices of over-enthusiastic exorcists and the boldness of clergy prepared to deny the reality of demonic possession altogether, attempted to steer a middle course and imposed increasingly strict controls on the practice of exorcism. These, in spite of reassurances that no change of doctrine had taken place, inevitably had the consequence of pushing exorcism to the margins of Catholic life.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Midelfort (2005b), p. 87.

  2. 2.

    Midelfort (2005a), pp. 18–9; see also Midelfort (2005b), p. 86.

  3. 3.

    Noydens, B. R., Práctica de exorcistas y ministros de la iglesia (Madrid, 1670).

  4. 4.

    Davies (2009), p. 60. Between 1690 and 1729 four editions of Menghi’s Flagellum daemonum and Fustis daemonum (individually and combined) were published, along with one edition of his Fuga daemonum (Midelfort (2005b), p. 83).

  5. 5.

    A Manual of Exorcism, very useful for Priests and Ministers of the Church, trans. E. Beyersdorf and J. D. Brady (New York: Hispanic Society of America, 1975). Brady’s translation of the title as A Manual of Exorcism is misleading; the Tratado was a treatise, meaning a discursive treatment of the entire process of exorcism. Manuals of exorcism contained prayers, conjurations and instructions (although an actual rite of exorcism is to be found as an appendix to the Tratado (pp. 91–107) along with blessings for salt, oil and holy water (pp. 111–18)).

  6. 6.

    Arbiol, A., Vocacion eclesiastica examinada con las divinas escrituras (Zaragoza, 1725), pp. 290–7.

  7. 7.

    On Basin see Baroja (1990), p. 33.

  8. 8.

    The Franciscan Candido Brugnoli (1607–77) was the author of the Alexicacon (Venice, 1714), aimed as much at physicians as at exorcists. On Brugnoli see Midelfort (2005b), pp. 83–4. It is unclear which of the many editions of Materia medica the author of the Tratado may have relied upon.

  9. 9.

    Picinelli, F. (trans. A. Erath), Mundus symbolicus in emblematum universitate (Cologne, 1687), 2 vols.

  10. 10.

    Tratado, p. 76; Picinelli, F., Mondo symbolico (Milan, 1678), vol. 2, pp. 583–5.

  11. 11.

    Tratado, pp. 13–16.

  12. 12.

    Ibid. pp. 51–2.

  13. 13.

    Ibid. pp. 21–2.

  14. 14.

    Ibid. p. 23. On the devil’s reluctance to speak Latin through ordinary people see Cervantes (1994), pp. 140–141.

  15. 15.

    Tratado, p. 24.

  16. 16.

    Ibid. p. 29.

  17. 17.

    Ibid. p. 30.

  18. 18.

    Ibid. p. 36.

  19. 19.

    Ibid. p. 69.

  20. 20.

    Ibid. p. 45.

  21. 21.

    Ibid. pp. 33–5.

  22. 22.

    Ibid. pp. 41–2.

  23. 23.

    Ibid. pp 37–8.

  24. 24.

    Ibid. pp. 40–1.

  25. 25.

    Ibid. p. 43.

  26. 26.

    Ibid. pp. 44–5.

  27. 27.

    Ibid. pp. 63–4.

  28. 28.

    Ibid. p. 77.

  29. 29.

    Ibid. p. 73.

  30. 30.

    Ibid. pp. 75–6.

  31. 31.

    On the sceptical reaction to exorcism see Romeo (2003), p. 115; Quantin, J.-L., Catholicisme Classique et les Pères de L’Eglise: un retour au sources (1669–1713) (Paris: Institut d’Etudes Augustiniennes, 1999), pp. 474–88.

  32. 32.

    Quoted in Brambilla (2010), n. p. 179: [Diabolus] callida machinatione, artibusque dolosis nonnullos exorcistas seduxit qui Medicorum Pharmaca, seu potius Pharmaceutica Deliramenta, [usi sunt] […] quae potius magica, quam exorcistica nuncupari merentur; etenim ex istis omnes superstitiosos ritus in exorcismis usque in hac die gliscentes, […] ad quos tollendos Eminentissimus Dominus Meus, qua edictis qua poenis, toto sui Vicariatus Urbis tempore vigilanter incubuit, elaboravitque tamquam ex proprio fonte oriri, miserosque exorcistas sub praedictorum Authorum fide, et clientula incaute decipi, et in superstitionibus ad gurgitem usque immergi compertum est.

  33. 33.

    Brambilla (2010), pp. 170–9.

  34. 34.

    Levack (2013), p. 233.

  35. 35.

    Cameron (2010), p. 310.

  36. 36.

    Levack (2013), pp. 217–19.

  37. 37.

    Brambilla (2010), p. 191.

  38. 38.

    On Crescentia see Pouliot, J. C., Vie de la Vénérable Marie-Crescence, Religieuse du Tiers Ordre de Saint-François au couvent de Kaufbeuren (Fraserville, QC: J. E. Frenette, 1895); Miller, A. M., Crescentia von Kaufbeuren: das Leben einer schwäbischen Mystikerin (Augsburg : Verlag Winifried-Werk, 1968); Boespflug, F., Dieu dans l’Art: Sollicitudini Nostrae de Benoît XIV et l’Affaire Crescence de Kaufbeuren (Paris: Cerf, 1984).

  39. 39.

    Quoted in Brambilla (2010), n. p. 191: In exorcizandis energuminis illud potissime interest, ut ante omnia dignoscatur, an re vera obsessus sit a daemone is qui talis affirmatur.

  40. 40.

    Mazzotti, M., The World of Maria Gaetana Agnesi, Mathematician of God (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007), pp. 98–101.

  41. 41.

    Midelfort (2005a), p. 7.

  42. 42.

    For general accounts of the Jansenists see Knox, R., Enthusiasm: A Chapter in the History of Religion (Oxford: Clarendon, 1950), pp. 176–230; Cragg, G. R., The Church and the Age of Reason 1648–1789, 2nd edn (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1967), pp. 25–30; 193–9. On the effect of Jansenism on attitudes to the supernatural see Young (2013), pp. 56–63.

  43. 43.

    Midelfort (2005a), pp. 8–9.

  44. 44.

    Klueting, H., ‘The Catholic Enlightenment in Austria or the Habsburg Lands’ in Lehner, U. L. and Printy, M. (eds), A Companion to the Catholic Enlightenment in Europe (Leiden: Brill, 2010), pp. 127–64, at p. 144.

  45. 45.

    De Waardt, ‘Demonic Possession: An Introductory Note’ in De Waardt et al. (2005), p. 26.

  46. 46.

    Brambilla (2010), pp. 237–8; see also Rousseau, G., ‘Depression’s Forgotten Genealogy: Notes towards a History of Depression’, History of Psychiatry 11 (2000), pp. 71–106, at pp. 74–5.

  47. 47.

    Ordo Baptizandi aliaeque Sacramenta administrandi … Pro Anglia, Hibernia et Scotia (Paris, 1738), pp. 107–8: Sacerdos, sive alius Exorcista rite confessus, aut saltem corde peccata sua detestans; peracto, si commode fieri potest, sanctissimo Missae sacrificio, divinoque auxiliis piis precibus implorato, Superpelliceo & Stola[m] violacea[m] (cujus extrema pars ad obsessi collum circumponatur) indutus, & coram se habens obsessum ligatum (si fuerit periculum) cum, se, & astantes communiat signo Crucis, & aspergat Aqua[m] benedicta[m], & genibus flexis, aliis respondentibus, dicat Litanias ordinarias, usque ad preces exclusive.

  48. 48.

    Ibid. p. 119.

  49. 49.

    Ibid. p. 123: Praedicta omnia, quatenus opus fuerit, repeti possunt, donec Obsessus sit omnino liberates. Juvabit praeterea plurimum super Obsessum devote saepeque repetere Pater noster, &c. Symbolum item Sancti Athanasii. Quicumque vult, &c. Item septem Psalmos poenitentiales; aliasque pias preces & Orationes, pro devotione Sacerdotis exorcizantis, & populi circumstantis.

  50. 50.

    Ibid. p. 25.

  51. 51.

    Epitome Ritualis Romani in usum missionum Scotiae ([Edinburgh], 1783), pp. 137–43.

  52. 52.

    Ibid. p. 160.

  53. 53.

    On Catholicism in Scotland after the Reformation see Anson, P. F., Underground Catholicism in Scotland (Montrose: Standard Press, 1970).

  54. 54.

    Cameron (2010), p. 312.

  55. 55.

    Midelfort (2005a), p. 9.

  56. 56.

    For a summary of Gassner’s career see Midelfort (2005a), pp. 14–6.

  57. 57.

    Midelfort (2005a), pp. 18–9.

  58. 58.

    Ibid. p. 22.

  59. 59.

    Ibid. pp. 95–8.

  60. 60.

    On eighteenth-century Catholic Patristic criticism see Quantin (1999), pp. 74–82.

  61. 61.

    Cameron (2010), pp. 293–4.

  62. 62.

    On Voltaire’s argument see Cameron (2010), p. 308.

  63. 63.

    Quoted in Midelfort (2005a), p. 51: omnino inductum ab ipso hunc exorcismorum morem tollendum abolendumque.

  64. 64.

    Tausiet (2005), p. 264.

  65. 65.

    Ibid. p. 265.

  66. 66.

    Ibid. p. 268.

  67. 67.

    Ibid. p. 273.

  68. 68.

    These included the hermitage of the Mare de Deu de la Balma in Zorita, Nuestra Señora de la Fuente de la Salud in Traiguera (both in Castellón), the collegiate church of Santa María in Cervera in Lérida, the chapel of Santa Orosia in the Cathedral of Jaca and the monastery of Cilla (both in the diocese of Huesca) and the shrine of Santo Cristo de Calatorao in Zaragoza itself (Tolosana, C. L., Demonios y Exorcismos en los Siglos de Oro (Madrid: Akal, 1990), p. 9).

  69. 69.

    Tausiet (2005), pp. 272–3.

  70. 70.

    Hoffman, E. T. A., The Devil’s Elixir (Edinburgh: William Blackwood, 1824), vol. 1, pp. 75, 84. On literary ridicule of exorcism see Cameron (2010), pp. 301–2.

  71. 71.

    See Young (2013), pp. 223–9 for an extended discussion of this exorcism.

  72. 72.

    Hone, J., The Moores of Moore Hall (London: Jonathan Cape, 1939), pp. 21–2.

  73. 73.

    Mulloy, S., ‘Moore, John (1767–99)’ in Dictionary of Irish Biography (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009), vol. 6, pp. 646–7.

  74. 74.

    Hone (1939), pp. 46–9.

  75. 75.

    Peter Moore to Catherine Moore, 5 May 1806; Peter Moore to Catherine Moore, 31 May 1806, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  76. 76.

    Thomas Moore to William Poynter, 29 November 1814, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  77. 77.

    William Poynter to James Ryan, 21 November 1814, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  78. 78.

    James Ryan to Thomas Moore, 25 April 1815, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  79. 79.

    Thomas Moore to William Poynter, 29 November 1814, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  80. 80.

    Thomas Moore to William Poynter, 12 January 1815, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  81. 81.

    James Ryan to Thomas Moore, 25 April 1815, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  82. 82.

    Thomas Moore to William Poynter, 25 July 1815, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  83. 83.

    William Poynter to Thomas Moore, 2 August 1815, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  84. 84.

    Thomas Moore to William Poynter, undated, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

  85. 85.

    William Poynter to Thomas Moore, 5 August 1815, typewritten transcription of the continuation of the correspondence held in the Archives of the Archbishop of Westminster, KHLC MSS U386/B12.

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    Francis Young

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Young, F. (2016). Exorcism in the Age of Reason. In: A History of Exorcism in Catholic Christianity. Palgrave Historical Studies in Witchcraft and Magic. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-29112-3_6

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