The New Gospel

If they imitate a goat, or grind their teeth, or if their right side be convulsed, they say that the mother of the gods is the cause.  But if they speak in a sharper and more intense tone, they resemble this state to a horse, and say that Poseidon is the cause.  Or if any excrement be passed … the appellation of Enodia is adhibited; or if it be passed in smaller and denser means, like bird’s, it is said to be from Apollo Nominus.  But if foam be emitted by the mouth, and the patient kick with his feet, Ares then gets the blame.  But terrors which happen during the night, and fevers and delirium, and jumpings out of bed, and frightful apparitions, and fleeing away—all these they hold to be plots of Hecate.”

It is thus with regard to the disease called Sacred [epilepsy]: it appears to me to be nowise more divine nor more sacred than other diseases, but has a natural cause from which it originates like other affections.  Men regard its nature and cause as divine from ignorance and wonder … But the brain is the cause of this affection, as it is of other very great diseases …”