14. Transmutationsa

SPHERA LUNAE SEMPITERNUM AUXILIUM St. AUGUSTINE questioned seriously whether Apuleius could have been changed into an ass by a Thessalian sorceress, and theologians have long debated about the transformation of Nebuchadnezzar into a wild beast, which things merely prove that the eloquent doctor of Hippo was unacquainted with magical secrets and that the theologians in question were not advanced far in exegesis. We are concerned in this chapter with different and more incredible marvels, which are at the same time incontestable. I refer to lycanthropy, or the nocturnal transformation of men into wolves, long celebrated in country tales of the twilight by the histories of werewolves. These accounts are so well attested that, with a view to their explanation, sceptical science has recourse to furious mania and masquerading as animals. But such hypotheses are puerile and account for nothing. Let us turn elsewhere for the secret of the phenomena which have been observed on this subject and begin with establishing (i) That no person has ever been killed by a werewolf, except by suffocation, without effusion of blood and without wounds; (2) That werewolves, though tracked, pursued and even maimed, have never been killed on the spot; (3) That persons suspected of these transformations have always been found at home, after a werewolf chase, more or less broken up, sometimes dying, but invariably in their natural form. Let us next establish phenomena of a different order. Nothing in the world is better borne out by evidence than the visible and real presence of P. Alphonsus Ligouri beside the dying pope, whilst the same personage was simultaneously seen at home, far from Rome, in prayer and ecstasy. Further, the simultaneous presence of the missionary Francis Xavier in several places at once has been no less strictly demonstrated. It will be said that these are miracles, but we reply that miracles when they are genuine are simply facts for science. Apparitions of persons dear to us coincidently with the moment of their death are phenomena of the same order and attributable to the same cause. We have spoken of the sidereal body, which is intermediary between the soul and the physical envelope. Now, this body frequently remains awake while the latter sleeps, and passes in thought through all space which universal magnetism opens before it. It lengthens without breaking the sympathetic chain which attaches it to our heart and brain, and it is for this reason that it is so dangerous to awaken dreamers suddenly. As a fact, too great a start may break the bond in an instant and cause immediate death. The form of our sidereal body is in correspondence with the habitual condition of our thoughts, and it modifies, in the long run, the characteristics of the material body. That is why Swedenborg, in his somnambulistic intuitions, frequently beheld spirits in the shape of various animals. Let us now make bold to say that a werewolf is nothing else but the sidereal body of a man whose savage and sanguinary instincts are typified by the wolf; who, further, whilst his phantom wanders over the country, is sleeping painfully in his bed and dreams that he is a wolf indeed. What makes the werewolf visible is the almost somnambulistic excitement caused by the fright of those who behold it, or else the tendency, more particularly in simple country persons, to enter into direct communication with the Astral Light, which is the common medium of visions and dreams. The hurts inflicted on the werewolf do actually wound the sleeping person by an odic and sympathetic congestion of the Astral Light, and by correspondence between the immaterial and material body.