RELIGIOUS LUNATICS AND MATTOIDS. 263

The truth is that, as he often confessed, he felt an
inward fire burning in his bones, and forcing him to
speak ; and as he was himself swept away by the force of
that ecstatic delirium, so he succeeded in carrying with
him his audience, who were moved by his words in a way
we find it hard to understand when we compare the
impression produced with the text of the sermons them-
selves."

This helps us to understand how — exactly in the same
manner as Lazzaretti— he propagated his divine mad-
ness among the people, not only epidemically, by the con-
tagion of ideas, but producing actual insanity in persons,
who, being nearly or quite without education, preached
and wrote extempore in consequence of their madness.
