But this, of course, was precisely the natural inference of savages.

Dr. Nevius catalogues the symptoms of possession thus: 

1.  The automatic, persistent and consistent acting out of a new personality, which calls himself shieng (genius) and calls the patient hiang to (incense burner, ’medium’).

2.  Possession of knowledge and intellectual power not owned by the patient (in his normal state), nor explainable on the pathological hypothesis.

3.  Complete change of moral character in the patient.

Of these notes, the second would, of course, most confirm the savage belief that a new intelligence had entered into the patient.  If he displayed knowledge of the future, or of the remote, the inference that a novel and wiser intelligence had taken possession of the patient’s body would be, to the savage, irresistible.  But the more cautious modern, even if he accepted the facts, would be reduced to no such extreme conclusion.  He would say that knowledge of the remote in space, or in the past, might be telepathically communicated to the brain of some living person; while, for knowledge of the future, he could fly, with Hartmann, to contact with the Absolute.

But the question of evidence for the facts is, of course, the only real question.  Now, in Dr. Nevius’s book, this evidence rests almost entirely on the written reports of native Christian teachers, for the Chinese were strictly reticent when questioned by Europeans.  ’My heathen brother, you have a sister who is a demoniac?’ asks the intelligent European.  The reply of the heathen brother is best left in the obscurity of a remarkably difficult and copious Oriental language.  We are thus obliged to fall back on the reports of Mr. Leng and other native Christian teachers.  They are perfectly modest and rational in style.  We learn that Mrs. Sen, a lady in her normal state incapable of lyrical efforts, lisped in numbers in her secondary personality, and detected the circumstance that Mr. Leng was on his way to see her, when she could not have learned the fact in any normal way.[8] ’They are now crossing the stream, and will be here when the sun is about so high;’ which was correct.  The other witnesses were examined, and corroborated.[9] Dr. Nevius himself examined Mrs. Kwo, when possessed, talking in verse, and, physically, limp.[10]

The narratives are of this type; the patient, on recovering consciousness, knows nothing of what has occurred; Christian prayers are often efficacious, and there are many anecdotes of movements of objects untouched.[11]

By a happy accident, as this chapter was passing through the press, a scientific account of a demoniac and his cure was published by Dr. Pierre Janet.[12] Dr. Janet has explained, with complete success, everything in the matter of possession, except the facts which, in the opinion of Dr. Nevius, were in need of explanation.  These facts did not occur in the case of the demoniac ‘exorcised’ by Dr. Janet.  Thus the learned essay of that eminent authority would not have satisfied Dr. Nevius.  The facts in which he was interested did not present themselves in Dr. Janet’s patient, and so Dr. Janet does not explain them.