But what the noblest of the old race of German emperors could not do suddenly, the German men of science did gradually.
Quietly and thoroughly, by proofs that could not be gainsaid, they recovered the old scientific fact established in pagan Greece and Rome, that madness is simply physical disease.

But they now established it on a basis that can never again be shaken; for, in post-mortem examinations of large numbers of "possessed" persons, they found evidence of brain-disease.

Typical is a case at Hamburg in 1729.

An afflicted woman showed in a high degree all the recognised characteristics of diabolic possession: exorcisms, preachings, and sanctified remedies of every sort were tried in vain; milder medical means were then tried, and she so far recovered that she was allowed to take the communion before she died: the autopsy, held in the presence of fifteen physicians and a public notary, showed it to be simply a case of chronic meningitis.

The work of German men of science in this field is noble indeed; a great succession, from Wier to Virchow, have erected a barrier against which all the efforts of reactionists beat in vain.( 378) (378) See Kirchhoff, pp.