σεληνιαζομένους, _lunatici_, Matt. iv, 24. Thus those sick persons were called, who were thought to suffer most severely at the changes of the moon; for example, epileptical persons, or those who have the falling sickness, insane persons, or those tormented with fits of morbid melancholy. Mad people are still called lunatics, from an ancient, but now almost exploded, opinion, that they are much influenced by that planet. A sounder philosophy has taught us, that, if there be any thing in it, it must be accounted for, not in the manner the ancients imagined, nor otherwise than by what the moon has in common with other heavenly bodies, occasioning various alterations in the gravity of our atmosphere, and thereby affecting human bodies. However, there is considerable reason to doubt the fact; and it is certain that the moon has no perceivable influence on our most accurate barometers. It has been the fashion to decry and ridicule the doctrine of demoniacal possessions, and to represent the patients merely as lunatics or madmen. And some think that this is countenanced by the calumny of the unbelieving Jews concerning Christ, He hath a demon, and is mad,” John x, 20; both possession and madness often producing the same symptoms of convulsions, paralysis, &c, Matt. xvii, 15–18. But that they were distinct diseases, may be collected from the following considerations: 1. The evangelists, enumerating the various descriptions of patients, distinguish δαιμονιζόμενοι, _demoniacs_, σεληνιαζόμενοι, _lunatics_, and ϖαραλυτικοί, _paralytics_, from persons afflicted with other kinds of diseases, Matt. iv, 24; Mark i, 34; Luke vi, 17, 18. 2. That a real dispossession took place, seems to follow from the number of these impure ...