“ This anticipating bent of mind has had innumerable occasions of exercising its powers from the long received doctrines of omens, ghofts, spectres, visions, witches and cloven-footed dæmons.
Where-ever knowledge and science are wanting, ignorance, dulness, and credulity dwell, and blind folly and rampant superstition will have numberless abertors and votaries: until the old woman is wholly expelled from our breasts, we shall remain abject slaves to the most ridiculous prejudices of habit, custom and education. ”

“ The modern Persians are the most superftitious people on earth, wholly addicted to, and governed by judicial astrology. The western Scots Islanders pretend to mantology and the second-sight; numbers amongst ourselves are slaves to the gloomy terror of dreams and fiery phantoms; and I myself have seen persons, who begged their daily bread, and knew not where to find lodgings at night, pretend to unfold and discover the impenetrable secrets of divine Providence. ”

“ But in every age and nation, where learning has reared aloft her polished head, where true philosophy is cultivated, where common sense is heard and listened to, there omens, apparitions, predictions, and black arts, are universally exploded, and justly derided ”

“ The horror with which we entertain the thoughts of death, or indeed of any future evil, and the uncertainty of its approach, fill a melancholy mind with innumerable apprehensions and suspicions, and consequently dispose it to the observa tion of such groundless prodigies and predictions. For as it is the chief concern of wise men to retrench the evils of life by the reasonings of philosophy; it is the employment of fools to multiply them by the sentiments of superstition. ”

“ They live by their craft; they are wind-merchants, and the mariners are such slaves to these impostors, that they often buy from them a magic cord, which, they vainly hope, will gain what wind they want. Egypt, the mother of occult sciences is at this day over-run with jugglers and slight-of-hand men. The native Americans are absorbed in superstition; they believe that some bad genii produce all their misery, and that jugglers are their ministers to predict future events. ”

“ I have known the shooting of a star spoil a nights rest; and have seen a man in love grow pale and lose his appetite, upon the plucking of a merry thought. A screech-owl at midnight has alarmed a family more than a band of robbers; nay, the voice of a cricket hath struck more terror than the roaring of a lion. There is nothing fo inconsiderable, which may not appear dreadful to an imagination that is filled with omens and prognostics. A rusty nail, or a crooked pin shoot up into prodigies. ”

“ Such an extravagant cast of mind engages multitudes of people, not only in impertinent terrors, but in supernumerary duties of life; and arises from that fear and ignorance which are natural to the soul of man. ”

“ But does not the devil and his retainers sometimes appear and seek their prey? No; impossible: For what is he? Why nothing but a servant in chains for rebellion; and whilst an all-good Being rules the universe, he cannot hurt a single sparrow. ”

“ It is to prevent these, and the like fatal consequences, that the wise Governor of the universe hath wrapt up the knowledge of future events in thick and pitchy darkness, impenetrable to human eyes: these are the secret things of the Almighty, into which no mortal should dare to pry: yesterday is irrecoverably gone; the morrow is yet unborn, and, perhaps, to us, may never be born; the present day, therefore, and that only is our's, and upon our right improvement of it depends our happiness, as well in this life as in that which is to come. ”

“ If by a witch you mean a person in confederacy with Satan, to hurt the bodies or estates of men, I deny that there ever was, or ever will be any such on earth. Such a confederacy is absolutely impossible: extol and magnify the devil's powers as much as you please, they are incommunicable. I believe that in former ages of rustic barbarity, and overwhelming fanaticism, envy and malice, oppression and tyranny, were the real and only causes of witch-craft. Whenever a poor woman was maligned by her neighbours, or was possessed of any thing they coveted, she was charged with this crime ”

“ Whatever be its cause, its effects are but too plain and obvious: for it naturally tends to unsettle and unhinge the mind, and to draw us off from the improvement of prefent advantages, and the enjoyment of present pleasures, by the fear of future evil that never may happen, and the hope of distant good that never may arrive. Were some men to foresee all the misfortunes that are to befal them, their spirits would sink under the terrible prospect ”

“ Again, Are their not such things as ghosts, visions or apparitions? Do we not read, and have we not heard of many of them well attested? No; I cannot believe them: Why? Because a ghost or spirit is, by its very nature, invisible; it cannot be seen: I allow indeed, that spirits have a vehicle for an instrument to them of local motion, which they may rarify or condense; but that they rove about on earth or air, like floating atoms, I cannot believe. Why? Because I believe in a particular Providence; that the supreme Being ruleth over all ”

“ I never did nor never shall see a real one till I go to the world of spirits. I dread not the great adversary of mankird, but I fear and constantly guard against his baits to seduce me into the paths of vice, to live impiously, impurely, and unjustly. ”

“ In a word, Sir, he asked me so many questions about his family, fortune, learning, interest and connexions, that, had I answered them all, I should have left nothing for him to do, but to draw some plain conclusion, which any man of common sense night have done as well as himself. ”

“ Persons have indeed been commissioned by him to predict future events, but this has never happened since the world had a plenary revelation of agenda and credenda. To presume then, from signs or prodigies above or beneath, to fore-know and foretel futurities, is the grossest profaneness and impiety; it is no less than to claim wisdom equal to our maker. ”

“ But though you cannot believe in ghosts and dæmons, there are certainly the spirits of dead men, who hover over their graves, and are to be seen in temples and church yards. No; I do not believe it. The souls of men after death pass over the irremea- ble gulph to the regions of separate spirits; they go to Him who made them; they ne- ver do, nor can return, till the heavens are no more: the bad are shut up, imprisoned, tortured, and in misery; the good are present with the source of bliss; they have for got their pilgrimage state, and endless joys fill their whole capacities. ”

“ The whole inhabitants of the globe verify the truth of these observations. In Lapland, which is as much covered with ignorance & superstition as it is with eternal snow, magicians and sorcerers abound. ”

“ An old maid, that is troubled with the vapours, produces infinite disturbances of this kind among her friends and neighbours. I know a maiden aunt, of a great family. who is one of these antiquated Sibyls, that forebodes and prophesies from one end of the year to the other. She is always seeing apparitions, and hearing death-watches ”

“ For which reason I took my leave immediately after dinner, and withdrew to my own lodgings. Upon my return home, I fell into a profound contemplation on the evils that attend these superstitious follies of mankind; how they subject us to immaginary afflictions, and additional sorrows, that do not properly come within our lot. As if the natural calamities of life were not sufficient for it, we turn the most indifferent cirLimstances into misfortunes, and suffer as much from trifling accidents, as from real evils. ”