tirely free from the least Allay or Mixture of any such Superstitions. OBSERVATIONS ON CHAP. XI. I FIND little that may be added concerning the exorcising haunted Houses, a Species of the Black Art which is now almost forgotten in this Kingdom. Perhaps the Form is worth preserving as a Curiosity, as we hang up rusty Pieces of old Armour: A Proof how much ado there may have been about nothing! (and yet it may be supposed not altogether for nothing neither!) St. Chrysostom is said to have insulted some African Conjurers of old with this humiliating and singular Observation: "Miserable and woeful Creatures that we are, we cannot so much as expel Fleas, much less Devils*." The * Obsession of the Devil, is distinguished from Possession in this: In Possession, the Evil One was said to enter into the Body of the Man:-In Obsession, without entering into the Body of the Person, he was thought to besiege and torment him without;-to be lifted up into the Air, and afterwards to be thrown down on the Ground violently, without receiving any Hurt:-to speak strange Languages, that the Person had never learn'd ;-not to be able to come near holy Things, or the Sacraments, but to have an Aversion to them;-to know and foretell secret Things-to perform Things that exceed the Person's Strength;-to say or do Things, that the Person would not or durst not say, if he were not externally moved to it, were the antient Marks and Criterions of Obsession. Calmet in Bailey's Dict. The old vulgar Ceremonies used in raising the Devil, such as making a Circle with Chalk, setting an old Hat in the Center of it, repeating The learned Selden observes on this Occasion, that there was never a merry World since the Fairies left dancing, and the Parson left conjuring*.The Opinion of the latter kept Thieves in Awe, and did as much Good in à Country as a Justice of Peace. This facetious and pointedly sensible Writer enquires farther, " Why have we now none possest "with Devils in England? The old Answer is, The "Devil hath the Protestants already, and the Pa 66 pists are so holy he dares not meddle with them.” Casting out Devils (he adds) is mere juggling; repeating the Lord's Prayer backwards, &c. &c. are now altogether obsolete, and seem to be forgotten even amongst our boys.None will desire to see them revived amongst them, yet it were to be wished that many of these little Gentry had not substituted the doing Things really bad for this seemingly profane, but truly ridiculous Mode, or rather Mockery of the antient magical Incantation! * I subjoin a very pertinent Quotation from the learned Author of the Origin and Increase of Depravity in Religion. 66 "Apud tum Poetas, tum Historiographos de magicis incantationibus, Exorcismis et Curatione tum hominum quam bellua"rum per Carmina haud pauca habentur, sed horum Impietatein "omnium superat longè hac in re Papismus--Hic enim supra Dei "potestatem posse Carmina, posse Exorcismos affimat-ita ut nihil "sit tam obstrusum in cœlis, quod Exorcismis non pateat, nihil tam “abditum in inferno, quod non eruatur-Nihil in Terrarum silentio “inclusum, quod non eliciatur-Nihil in hominum pectoribus cons "ditum, quod non reveletur—nihil ablatum, quod non restituatur, "et nihil quod habet Orbis, sive insit, sive non, è quo Damon non ejiciatur." Moresini Deprav. Rel. Orig. p. 8. Pliny tells us that Houses were antiently hallowed against Evil Spirits with Brimstone! This Charm has been converted by later Times into what our Satyrist, Churchill, in his Prophecy of Famine, calls" a precious and rure Medicine," and is now used (but I suppose with greater Success) in exorcising those of our unfortunate Fellow-Creatures, who are haunted or possessed with a certain fiery Spirit, said by the Wits of the South to be well known, seen, and felt, and very troublesome in the North! they they never cast out any but what they first cast in; They do it where for Reverence no Man shall dare to examine it; they do it in a Corner, in a Mortice-hole, not in the Market-place. They do nothing but what may be done by Art; they make the Devil fly out of the Window in the Likeness of a Bat, or a Rat. Why do they not hold him? Why in the Likeness of a Bat, or a Rat, or some Creature? that is, Why not in some Shape we paint him in, with Claws and Horns? Answer may be made to his pertinent Question, that real Bats and Rats may be procured-but every Carver is not to be trusted with the making of a horned or clovenfooted Image of the Devil. Impious and antichristian Rome*! it is impossible to say how much thou hast prejudiced the Cause of manly and rational Religion by these, and the like thy childish (to give no harsher Name to thy) Fooleries and Superstitions! * In an Age when every wretched Sophister, drawing his Conclusions from false Premises, wishes to confound the pure Spirit of Christian Philosophy with these and the like Adulterations of it, I must at least be pardoned for obtruding the subsequent Eulogy, extracted from an old Tragedy;-no professed Divine has perhaps ever exhibited more forcibly the Grandeur and Utility of Christianity, than these few Lines do: "If these are Christian Virtues, I am Christian, Hill's Alzira. CHAP. CHAP. XII. Of Saturday Afternoon: how observed of old, by the ancient Christians, the Church of Scotland, and the old Church of England: What End we should observe it for: An Exhortation to the Observation of it. It is usual, in Country Places and Villages, where the Politeness of the Age hath made no great Conquest, to observe some particular Times with some Ceremonies, which were customary in the Days of our Fore-fathers: Such are the great Festivals of Christmas, Easter, and several others, which they observe with Rites and Customs appropriated to them. Among these we find a great Deference paid to Saturday Afternoon, above the other worky Days of the Week: Then the Labours of the Plough ceast, and Refreshments and Ease are over all the Village. This seems to be the Remains of a laudable Custom once in this Land (but now almost buried in that general Contempt of Religion 66 and Love of the World, which prevail so much every where) of attending the Evening Prayers on Saturday, and laying aside the Concerns of this Life, to be fitter for the Duties of the Day following. For *"it was an holy Cus"tom among our Fore-fathers, when at the Ringing to Prayer the Ete before the Sab"bath, the Husbandman would give over his "Labour in the Field, and the Tradesman his "Work in the Shop, and go to Evening Prayer in the Church, to prepare their Souls, that their Minds might more chearfully attend GOD's Worship on the SabbathDay." 66 66 66 66 And indeed it was the Custom both of the Jewish and the Christian Church. They neither of them entred upon the Sabbath, without some Preparation for it. Moses + taught the Jews to remember the Sabbath over Night; from whence in all Probability it comes to pass, that the Eve of the Jewish Sabbath is called the Preparation. The Preparation mentioned by the Evangelists, begun at Three a Clock on Friday Afternoon; it was proclaimed with the Noise of Trumpets and Horns, that they might be better put in Mind Baily, Prac. Piety, P. 453. + Exod. xvi. Mark xiv. of |