A PHILOSOPHICAL ENDEAVOUR Towards the Defence of the Being OF WITCHES AND APPARITIONS In A LETTER To the much Honoured ROBERT HUNT Esq By a Member of THE ROYAL SOCIETY LONDON Printed by I. Grismond for james Collins at the King's Arms in Ivy-Lane 1666. Some CONSIDERATIONS About WITCHCRAFT In A Letter to the much Honoured Robert Hunt Esquire SIR THE late and frequent deal you have had in the Examination of Witches and the Regards of one that hath a very particular and deserved Honour for you have brought you the trouble of some Considerations upon the subject in which you have so critically conversed that perhaps may suggest to your better thoughts a way of accounting for some of those strange things you have been a witness of and contribute to the Defence of the Truth of Matters which you know by Experiments that could not deceive against the little exceptions of those that are resolved to believe nothing in affairs of this nature If any thing were to be much admired in an Age of Wonders not only of Nature which is a constant Prodigy but of Men and Manners it would be to me matter of Astonishment that Men otherwise witty and ingenious are fallen into the conceit that there 's no such thing as a Witch or Apparition but that these are the creatures of Melancholy and Superstition fostered by ignorance and design which comparing the confidence of their disbelief with the evidence of the things denied and the weakness of their grounds would almost suggest that themselves are an argument of what they deny and that so confident an Opinion could not be held upon such inducements but by some kind of Witchcraft and Fascination in the Fancy And perhaps that evil Spirit whose influences they will not allow in Actions ascribed to such Causes hath a greater hand and interest in their Proposition than they are ware of For that subtle Enemy of Mankind since Providence will not permit him to mischief us without our own concurrence attempts that by stratagem and artifice which he could never effect by open ways of acting and the success of all wiles depending upon their secrecy and concealment his influence is never more dangerous than when his agency is least suspected In order therefore to the carrying on the dark and hidden designs he manageth against our Happiness and our Souls he cannot expect to advantage himself more then by insinuating a belief That there is no such thing as himself but that fear and fancy make Devils now as they did Gods of old Nor can he ever draw the assent of men to so dangerous an assertion while the standing sensible evidences of his existence in his practices by and upon his Instruments are not discredited and removed 'T is doubtless therefore the interest of this Agent of darkness to have the world believe that the notion they have of him is but a phantasm and conceit and in order thereunto That the stories of Witches Apparitions and indeed every thing that brings tidings of another world are but melancholic Dreams and pious Romances And when men are arrived thus far to think there are no diabolical contracts or apparitions their belief that there are such Spirits rests only upon their Faith and Reverence to the Divine Oracles which we have little reason to apprehend so great in such assertors as to command much from their assent especially in such things in which they have corrupt interests against their evidence So that he that thinks there is no Witch believes a Devil gratis or at least upon such inducements which he is like to find himself disposed to deny when he pleaseth And when men are arrived to this degree of diffidence and infidelity we are beholden to them if they believe either Angel or Spirit Resurrection of the Body or Immortality of Souls These things hang together in a Chain of connexion at least in these men's Hypothesis and 't is but an happy chance if he that hath lost one link hold another So that the vitals of Religion being so much interressed in this subject it will not be impertinent particularly to discourse it And in order to the proof that there have been and are unlawful confederacies with evil spirits by virtue of which the hellish accomplices perform things above their natural powers I must premise that this being matter of Fact is only capable of the evidence of authority and sense And by both these the being of Witches and diabolical contracts is most abundantly confirmed All Histories are full of the exploits of those Instruments of darkness and the testimony of all Ages not only of the rude and barbarous but of the most civilised and polished world brings tidings of their strange performances We have the attestation of thousands of eye and ear-witnesses and those not of the easily deceivable vulgar only but of wise and grave discerners and that when no interest could oblige them to agree together in a common Lie I say we have the light of all these circumstances to confirm us in the belief of things done by persons of despicable power and knowledge beyond the reach of Art and ordinary Nature standing public Records have been kept of these well attested Relations and Epocha's made of those unwonted events Laws in many Nations have been enacted against those vile practices those among the jews and our own are notorious such cases have been often determined near us by wise and reverend judges upon clear and convictive evidence and thousands in our own Nation have suffered death for their vile compacts with apostate spirits All these I might largely prove in their particular instances but that 't is not needful since those that deny the being of Witches do it not out of ignorance of these Heads of Argument of which probably they have heard a thousand times but from an apprehension that such a belief is absund and the things impossible And upon these presumptions they contemn all demonstrations of this nature and are hardened against conviction And I think those that can believe all Histories are Romances that all the wiser world have agreed together to juggle mankind into a common belief of ungrounded fables that the sound senses of multitudes together may deceive them and Laws are built upon Chimaeras that the gravest and wisest judges have been Murderers and the sagest persons Fools or designing Impostors I say those that can believe this heap of absurdities are either more credulous than those whose credulity they reprehend or else have some extraordinary evidence of their persuasion viz. That 't is absurd and impossible there should be a Witch or Apparition And I am confident were those little appearances removed which men have formed in their fancies against the belief of such things their evidence would make its way to their assent without any more arguments then what they know already to enforce it There is nothing then necessary to be done in order to the establishing the belief I would reconcile to men's minds but to endeavour the removal of those prejudices they have received against it the chief of which I shall particularly deal with and I begin with that bold Assertion That 1 The notion of a Spirit is impossible and contradictious and consequently so is that of Witches the belief of which is founded on that Doctrine To which Objection I answer 1 If the notion of a Spirit be so absurd as is pretended that of a God and a Soul distinct from matter and immortal is likewise an absurdity And then that the world was jumbled into this elegant and orderly Fabric by chance and that our Souls are only parts of Matter that came together we know not whence nor how and shall again shortly be dissolved into those lose Atoms that compound them That all our conceptions are but the thrusting of one part of matter against another and the Ideas of our minds mere blind and casual motions These and a thousand more the grossest impossibilities and absurdities consequents of this Proposition That the notion of a Spirit is absurd will be sad certainties and demonstrations And with such Assertors I would cease to discourse about Witches and Apparitions and address myself to obtain their assent to truths infinitely more Sacred And yet 2 though it should be granted them that a substance immaterial is as much a contradiction as they can fancy yet the Air and all the Regions above us may have their invisible intellectual Agents of nature like unto our Souls be that what it will and some of them at least as much drgenerate as the vilest and most mischievous among Men. This I say may reasonably enough be supposed though as I intimated above the Atheist hath another chain of consequences And this Hypothesis will be enough to secure the possibility of Witches and Apparitions and that all the upper Stories of the Universe are furnished with Inhabitants 't is infinitely reasonable to conclude from the analogy of Nature Since we see there is nothing so contemptible and vile in the world we reside in but hath its living creatures that dwell upon it the Earth the Water the inferior Air the Bodies of Animals the flesh the skin the entrails the leaves the roots the stalks of Vegetables yea and all kind of Minerals in the subterraneous Regions I say all these have their proper Inhabitants yea I suppose this Rule may hold in all distinct kinds of bodies in the world That they have their peculiar Animals The certainty of which I believe the improvement of microscopical observations will discover From whence I infer That since this little spot is so thickly peopled in every Atom of it 't is weakness to think that all the vast spaces above and hollows under ground are desert and uninhabited And if both the superior and lower Continents of the Universe have their inhabitants also 't is exceedingly improbable arguing from the same analogy that they are all of the mere sensible nature but that there are at least some of the Rational and Intellectual Orders Which supposed there is good foundation for the belief of Witches and Apparitions though the notion of a Spirit should prove absurd and unphilosophical And so this first Objection comes to nothing I descend then to the second Prejudice which may be thus form in behalf of the Objectors 2 There are Actions in most of those Relations ascribed to Witches which are ridiculous and impossible in the nature of things such are 1 their flying out of windows after they have anointed themselves to remote places 2 Their transformation into Cats Hares and other Creatures 3 Their feeling all the hurts in their own bodies which they have received in these 4 Their raising Tempests by muttering some nonsensical words or performing some little ridiculous ceremonies And 5 their being sucked in a certain private place of their bodies by a Familiar These are presumed to be actions inconsistent with the nature of Spirits and above the powers of those poor and miserable Agents And therefore the Objection supposeth them performed only by the fancy and that the whole mystery of Witchcraft is but an illusion of crazy imagination But to this Objection I return 1 in the general The more absurd and unaccountable these actions seem the greater confirmations are they to me of the truth of those Relations and the reality of what the Objectors would destroy For these circumstances being exceeding unlikely judging by the measures of common belief 't is the greater probability they are not fictitious For the contrivers of Fictions use to form them as near as they can conformably to the most unsuspected realities endeavouring to make them look as like truth as is possible in the main supposals though withal they make them strange in the circumstance None but a fool or madman would relate with a purpose of having it believed that he saw in Ireland Men with hoofs on their heads and eyes in their posteriors or if any should be so ridiculously vain as to be serious in such an incredible Romance it cannot be supposed that all Travellers that come into those parts after him should tell the same story There is large field in fiction and if all those Relations were arbitrary compositions doubtless the first Romancers would have framed them more agreeable to the common doctrine of Spirits at least after these supposed absurdities had been a thousand times laughed at people by this time would have learned to correct those obnoxious extravagancies and though they have not yet more veracity than the Ages of Ignorance and Superstition yet one would expect they should have got more cunning This supposed impossibility then of these performances seems to me a probable argument that they are not wilful and disigned forgeries And if they are Phancyes 't is somewhat strange that Imagination which is the most various thing in all the world should infinitely repeat the same conceit in all times and places But again 2 the strange Actions related of Witches and presumed impossible are not ascribed to their own powers but to the Agency of those wicked Confederates they employ And to affirm that those evil spirits cannot do that which we conceit impossible is boldly to stint the powers of Creatures whose natures and faculties we know not and to measure the world of spirits by the narrow rules of our own impotent beings We see among ourselves the performances of some outgo the conceits and possibilities of others and we know many things may be done by the Mathematics and Mechanic Artifice which common heads think impossible to be effected by the honest ways of Art and Nature And doubtless the subtleties and powers of those mischievous Fiends are as much beyond the reach and activities of the most knowing Agents among us as theirs are beyond the wit and ability of the most rustic and illiterate So that the utmost that any man's reason in the world can amount to in this particular is only this that he cannot conceive how such things can be performed which only argues the weakness and imperfection of our knowledge and apprehensions not the impossibility of those performances and we can no more from hence form an Argument against them then against the most ordinary effects in Nature We cannot conceive how the Faetus is formed in the womb nor as much as how a Plant springs from the Earth we tread on we know not how our Souls move the Body nor how these distant and extreme natures are united And if we are ignorant of the most obvious things about us and the most considerable within ourselves 't is then no wonder that we know not the constitution and powers of the Creatures to whom we are such strangers Briefly then matters of fact well proved ought not to be denied because we cannot conceive how they can be performed Nor is it a reasonable method of inference first to presume the thing impossible and thence to conclude that the fact cannot be proved On the contrary we should judge of the action by the evidence and not the evidence by the measures of our fancies about the action This is proudly to exalt our own opinions above the clearest testimonies and most sensible demonstrations of fact and so to give the Lie to all Mankind rather than distrust the little conceits of our bold imaginations But yet further 3. I think there is nothing in the instances mentioned but what may as well be accounted for the Rules of Reason and Philosophy as the ordinary affairs of Nature For in resolving natural Phaenomena we can only assign the probable causes showing how things may be not presuming how they are And in the particulars under our Examen we may give an account how 't is possible and not unlikely that such things though somewhat varying from the common road of Nature may be acted And if our narrow and contracted minds can furnish us with apprehensions of the way and manner of such performances though perhaps not the true ones 't is an argument that such things may be effected by creatures whose powers and knowledge are so vastly exceeding ours I shall endeavour therefore briefly to suggest some things that may render the possibility of these performances conceivable in order to the removal of this Objection that they are contradictions and impossible For the First then That the confederate Spirit should transport the Witch through the Air to the place of general Rendezvous there is no difficulty in conceiving and if that be true which great Philosophers affirm concerning the real separability of the Soul from the Body without death there is yet less for then 't is easy to apprehend that the Soul having left its gross and sluggish Body behind it and being clothed only with its immediate vehicle of Air or more subtle matter may be quickly conducted to any place it would be at by those officious Spirits that attend it And though I adventure to affirm nothing concerning the truth and certainty of this supposition yet I must needs say it doth not seem to me unreasonable And our experience of Apoplexies Epilepsies Ecstasies and the strange things men report to have seen during those deliquiums look favourably upon this conjecture which seems to me to contradict no principle of Reason or Philosophy since Death consists not so much in the actual separation of Soul and Body as in the indisposition and unfitness of the Body for vital union as an excellent Philosopher hath made good On which Hypothesis the Witches anointing herself before she takes her flight may perhaps serve to keep the Body tenantable & in fit disposition to receive the Spirit at its return These things I say we may conceive though I affirm nothing about them and there is nothing in such conceptions but what hath been affirmed by men of worth and name and may seem fair and accountable enough to those who judge not altogether by the measures of the popular and customary opinion And there 's a saying of a great Apostle that seems to countenance this Platonic opinion what is the meaning else of that expression Whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell except the Soul may be separated from the Body without death which if it be granted possible 't is sufficient for my purpose And 2 The Transformations of Witches into the shapes of other Animals upon the same supposal is very conceivable since then 't is easy enough to imagine that the power of imagination may form those passive and pliable vehicles into those shapes with more ease than the fancy of the Mother can the stubborn matter of the Foetus in the womb as we see it frequently doth in the instances that occur of Signatures and monstrous Singularities And perhaps sometimes the confederate Spirit puts tricks upon the senses of the spectators and those shapes are only illusions But then 3 when they feel the hurts in their gross bodies that they receive in their airy vehicles they must be supposed to have been really present at least in these latter and 't is no more difficult to apprehend how the hurts of those should be translated upon their other bodies then how diseases should be inflicted by the imagination or how the fancy of the Mother should wound the Foetus as several credible relations do attest And 4 for their raising storms and tempests they do it not be sure by their own but by the power of the Prince of the Air their friend and ally and the Ceremonies that are enjoined them are doubtless nothing else but entertainments for their imaginations and are likely designed to persuade them that they do these strange things themselves And lastly for their being sucked by the Familiar I say 1 we know so little of the nature of Daemons and Spirits that 't is no wonder we cannot certainly divine the reason of so strange an action And yet 2 we may conjecture at some things that may render it less improbable For some have thought that the Genii whom both the Platonical and Christian Antiquity thought embodied are recreated by the reeks and vapours of humane blood and the spirits that derive from them Which supposal if we grant them bodies is not unlikely every thing being refreshed and nourished by its like And that they are not perfectly abstract from all body and matter besides the reverence we own to the wisest antiquity there are several considerable arguments I could allege to render it exceeding probable Which things supposed the Devil 's sucking the Sorceress is no great wonder nor difficult to be accounted for Or perhaps 3 this may be only a diabolical Sacrament and Ceremony to confirm the hellish covenant To which I add 4 That which to me seems most probable viz. That the Familiar doth not only suck the Witch but in the action infuseth some poisonous ferment into her which gives her imagination and spirits a magical tincture whereby they become mischievously influential and the word venifica intimates some such matter Now that the imagination hath a mighty power in operation is seen in the just now mentioned Signatures and Diseases that it causeth and that the fancy is modified by the qualities of the blood and spirits is too evident to need proof which things supposed 't is plain to conceive that the evil spirit having breathed some vile vapour into the body of the Witch it may taint her blood and spirits with a noxious quality by which her infected imagination heightened by melancholy and this worse cause may do much hurt upon bodies that are impressive by such influences And 't is very likely that this ferment disposeth the imagination of the Sorceress to cause the mentioned or separation of the soul from the body and may perhaps keep the body in fit temper for its reentry as also it may facilitate transformation which it may be could not be effected by ordinary and unassisted imagination Thus we see 't is not so desperate to form an apprehension of the manner of these odd performances and though they are not done the way I have described yet what I have said may help us to a conceit of the possibility which sufficeth for my purpose And though the Hypothesis I have gone upon will seem as unlikely to some as the things they attempt to explain are to others yet I must desire their leave to suggest that most things seem unlikely especially to the conceited and opinionative at first proposal and many great truths are strange and improbable till custom and acquaintance have reconciled them to our fancies And I 'll presume to add on this occasion though I love not to be confident in affirming that there is none of the Platonical supposals I have used but what I could make appear to be fair and reasonable to the capable and unprejudiced But I come 3 to another prejudice against the being of Witches which is That 't is very improbable that the Devil who is a wise and mighty spirit should be at the beck of a poor Hag and have so little to do as to attend the errands of the impotent lusts of a silly old woman To which I might answer 1 That 't is much more improbable that all the world should be deceived in matters of fact and circumstances of the clearest evidence and conviction then that the Devil who is wicked should be also unwise and that he that persuades all his subjects and accomplices out of their wits should himself act like his own temptations and persuasions In brief there is nothing more strange in this objection than that wickedness is baseness and servility and that the Devil is at leisure to serve those he is at leisure to tempt and industrious to ruin And again 2 I see no necessity to believe that the Devil is always the Witch's confederate but perhaps it may fitly be considered whether the Familiar be not some departed humane spirit forsaken of God and goodness and swallowed up by the unsatiable desire of mischief and revenge which possibly by the laws and capacity of its state it cannot execute immediately And why we should presume that the Devil should have the liberty of wand'ring up and down the Earth and Air when he is said to be held in the chains of darkness and yet that the separated souls of the wicked of whom no such thing is affirmed in any Sacred Record should be thought so imprisoned that they cannot possibly wag from the place of their confinement I know no shadow of conjecture This conceit I 'm confident hath prejudiced many against the belief of Witches and Apparitions they not being able to conceive that the Devil should be so ludicrous as appearing spirits are sometimes reported to be in their frolicks and they presume that souls departed never re-visit the free and open Regions which confidence I know nothing to justify For since good men in their state of separation are said to be why the wicked may not be supposed to be in the worst sense of the word I know nothing to help me to imagine And if it be supposed that the Imps of Witches are sometimes wicked spirits of our own kind and nature and possibly the same that have been Sorcerers and Witches in this life This supposal may give a fairer and more probable account of many of the actions of Sorcery and Witchcraft than the other Hypothesis that they are always Devils And to this conjecture I 'll adventure to subjoin another which also hath its probability viz. 3 That 't is not impossible but that the Familiars of Witches are a servile kind of spirits of a very inferior constitution and nature and none of those that were once of the highest Hierarchy now degenerated into the spirits we call Devils And for my part I must confess that I think the common division of spirits much too general conceiving it likely there may be as great a variety of Intellectual creatures in the invisible world as there is of Animals in the visible and that all the superior yea and inferior Regions have their several kinds of spirits differing in their natural perfections as well as in the kinds and degrees of their depravities which being supposed 't is very probable that those of the basest and meanest Orders are they who submit to the mentioned servilities And thus the sagess and grandeur of the Prince of darkness need not be brought into question But 4 the opinion of Witches seems to some to accuse Providence and to suggest that it hath exposed Innocents' to the fury and malice of revengeful Fiends yea and supposeth those most obnoxious for whom we might most reasonably expect a more special tutelary care and protection most of the cruel practices of those presumed Instruments of Hell being upon Children who as they least deserve to be deserted by that Providence that superintends all things so they most need its guardian influence To this so specious an Objection I have these things to answer 1 Providence is a Deep unfathomable and if we should not believe the Phoenomena of our senses before we can reconcile them to our notions of Providence we must be grosser Sceptics then ever yet was extant The miseries of the present life the unequal distributions of good and evil the ignorance and barbarity of the greatest part of mankind the fatal disadvantages we all are under and the hazard we run of being eternally miserable and undone these I say are things that can hardly be made consistent with that Wisdom and Goodness that we are sure hath made and mingled itself with all things And yet we believe there is a beauty and harmony and goodness in that Providence though we cannot unriddle it in particular instances nor by reason of our ignorance and imperfection clear it from contradicting appearances and consequently we ought not to deny the being of Witches and Apparitions because they will create us some difficulties in our notions of Providence But to come more close 2 Those that believe that Infants are Heirs of Hell & Children of the Devil as soon as they are disclosed to the world cannot certainly offer such an objection for what is a little trifling pain of a moment to those eternal tortures to which if they die as soon as they are born according to the tenor of this Doctrine they are everlastingly exposed But however the case stands as to that 't is certain 3 That Providence hath not secured them from other violences they are obnoxious too from cruelty and accident and yet we accuse It not when a whole Townful of Innocents' fall a Victim to the rage and freity of barbarous executioners in wars and Massacres To which I add 4 That 't is likely the mischief is not so often done by the evil spirit immediately but by the malignant influence of the Sorceress whose power of hurting consists in the forementioned ferment which is infused into her by the Familiar So that I am apt to think there may be a power of real fascination in the Witch's eyes and imagination by which for the most part she acts upon tender bodies Nescio quis teneros oculus For the pestilential spirits being darted by a spiteful and vigorous imagination from the eye and meeting with those that are weak and passive in the bodies which they enter will not fail to infect them with a noxious quality that makes dangerous and strange alterations in the person invaded by this poisonous influence which way of acting by subtle and invisible instruments is ordinary and familiar in all natural efficiencies And 't is now past question that nature for the most part acts by subtle streams and aporhaeas of minute particles which pass from one body to another Or however that be this kind of agency is as conceivable as any of those qualities ignorance hath called sympathy and antipathy the reality of which we doubt not though the manner of action be unknown Yea the thing I speak of is as easy to be apprehended as how infection should pass in certain tenuious streams through the air from one house to another or as how the biting of a mad Dog should fill all the blood and spirits with a venomous and malign ferment the application of the virtue doing the same in our case as that of contact doth in this Yea some kinds of fascination are performed in this grosser and more sensible way as by striking giving Apples and the like by which the contagious quality may be transmitted as we see diseases often are by the touch Now in this way of conjecture a good account may be given why Witches are most powerful upon Children & timorous persons viz. because their spirits and imaginations being weak and passive are not able to resist the fatal invasion whereas men of bold minds who have plenty of strong and vigorous spirits are secure from the contagion as in pestilential Airs clean bodies are not so liable to infection as are other tempers Thus than we see 't is likely enough that very often the Sorceress herself doth the mischief and we know de facto that Providence doth not always secure us from one another's injuries And yet I must confess that many times also the evil spirit is the mischievous Agent though this confession draw on me another objection which I next propose 5 Then it may be said that if wicked spirits can hurt us by the direction and at the desire of a Witch one would think they should have the same power to do us injury without instigation or compact and if this be granted 't is a wonder that we are not always annoyed and infested by them To which I return 1 That the laws liberties and restraints of the inhabitants of the other world are to us utterly unknown and this way we can only argue ourselves into confessions of our ignorance which every man must acknowledge that is not as immodest as ignorant It must be granted by all that own the being power and malice of evil spirits that the security we enjoy is wonderful whether they act by Witches or not and by what Laws they are kept from making us a prey to speak like Philosophers we cannot tell yea why they should be permitted to tempt and ruin us in our Souls and restrained from touching or hurting us in our Bodies is a mystery not easily accountable But yet 2 though we acknowledge their power to vex and torment us in our bodies also yet a reason may be given why they are less frequent in this kind of mischief viz. because their main designs are levelled against the interest and happiness of our Souls which they can best promote when their actions are most sly and secret whereas did they ordinarily persecute men in their bodies their agency and wicked influence would be discovered and make a mighty noise in the world whereby men would be awakened to a more suitable and vigorous opposition by the use of such means as would engage Providence to rescue them from their rage and cruelties & at last defeat them in their great purposes of undoing us eternally Thus we may conceive that the security we enjoy may well enough consist with the power and malice of those evil spirits and upon this account we may suppose that Laws of their own may prohibit their unlicensed infuries not from any goodness there is in their Constitutions but in order to the more successful carrying on the projects of the dark Kingdom as Generals forbidden plunder not out of love to their Enemies but in order to their own success And hence 3 we may suppose a Law of permission to hurt us at the instance of the Sorceress may well stand with the polity of Hell since by gratifying the wicked person they encourage her in malice and revenge and promote thereby the main ends of their black confederacy which are to propagate wickedness and to ruin us in our eternal interests And yet 4 't is clear to those that believe the History of the Gospel that wicked spirits have vexed the bodies of men without any instigation that we read of and at this day 't is very likely that many of the strange accidents and diseases that befall us may be the infliction of evil spirits prompted to hurt us only by the delight they take in mischief So that we cannot argue the improbability of their hurting Children and others by Witches from our own security and freedom from the effects of their malice which perhaps we feel in more instances than we are ware of But 6 another prejudice against the belief of Witches is a presumption upon the enormous force of melancholy and imagination which without doubt can do wonderful things and beget strange persuasions and to these causes some ascribe the presumed effects of Sorcery and Witchcraft To which I reply briefly and yet I hope sufficiently 1 That to resolve all the clear circumstances of fact which we find in well attested and confirmed Relations of this kind into the power of deceivable imagination is to make fancy the greater prodigy and to suppose that it can do stranger feats than are believed of any other kind of fascination And to think that pins and Nails for instance can by the power of imagination be conveyed within the skin or that imagination should deceive so many as have been witnesses in objects of sense in all the circumstances of discovery this I say is to be infinitely more credulous than the assertors of Sorcery and Demonaick contracts And by the same reason it may be believed that all the Battles and strange events of the world which ourselves have not seen are but dreams and fond imaginations and like those that are fought in the clouds when the brains of the deluded spectators are the only Theatre of those fancied transactions And 2 to deny evidence of fact because their imagination may deceive the Relators when we have no reason to think so but a bare presumption that there is no such thing as is related is quite to destroy the credit of all humane testimony and to make all men liars in a larger sense than the Prophet concluded in his haste For not only the melancholic and the fanciful but the grave and the sober whose judgements we have no reason to suspect to be tainted by their imaginations have from their own knowledge & experience made reports of this nature But to this it will possibly be rejoined the Reply will be another prejudice against the belief I contend for viz. 7 That 't is a suspicious circumstance that Witchcraft is but a fancy since the persons that are accused are commonly poor and miserable old women who are overgrown with discontent and melancholy which are very imaginative and the persons said to be bewitched are for the most part Children or people very weak who are easily imposed upon and are apt to receive strong impressions from nothing whereas were there any such thing really 't is not likely but that the more cunning and subtle desperadoes who might the more successfully carry on the mischievous designs of the dark Kingdom should be oftener engaged in those black confederacies and also one would expect effects of the hellish combination upon others than the innocent and the ignorant To which Objection it might perhaps be enough to return as hath been above suggested that nothing can be concluded by this and such like arguings but that the policy and menages of the instruments of darkness are to us altogether unknown and as much in the dark as their natures mankind being no more acquainted with the reasons and methods of action in the other world then poor Cottagers and Mechanics are with the intriques' of Government and reasons of State Yea peradventure 2 't is one of the great designs as 't is certainly the interest of those wicked Agents and Machinators industriously to hid from us their influences and ways of acting and to work as near as is possible incognito upon which supposal 't is easy to conceive a reason why they most commonly work by and upon the weak and the ignorant who can make no cunning observations or tell credible tales to detect their artifice Besides 3 't is likely a strong imagination that cannot be weakened or disturbed by a busy and subtle ratiotination is a necessary requisite to those wicked performances and without doubt an heightened and obstinate fancy hath a great influence upon impressive spirits yea and as I have conjectured before on the more passive and susceptible bodies And I am very apt to believe that there are as real communications and intercourses between our spirits as there are between material agents which secret influences though they are unknown in their nature and ways of acting yet they are sufficiently felt in their effects for experience attests that some by the very majesty and greatness of their spirits discovered by nothing but a certain noble air that accompanies them will bear down others less great and generous and make them sneak before them and some by I know not what stupifying virtue will tie up the tongue and confine the spirits of those who are otherwise brisk and voluble Which thing supposed the influences of a spirit possessed of an active and enormous imagination may be malign and fatal where they cannot be resisted especially when they are accompanied by those poisonous reaks that the evil spirit breathes into the Sorceress which likely are shot out and applied by a fancy heightened and prepared by melancholy and discontent And thus we may conceive why the melancholic and envious are used upon such occasions and for the same reason the ignorant since knowledge checks and controls imagination and those that abound much in the imaginative faculties do not usually exceed in the rational And perhaps 4 the Daemon himself useth the imagination of the Witch so qualified for this purpose even in those actions of mischief which are more properly his for it is most probable that spirits act not upon bodies immediately and by their naked essence but by means proportionate and suitable in instruments that they use upon which account likely 't is so strictly required that the Sorceress should believe that so her imagination might be more at the devotion of the mischievous Agent And for the same reason also Ceremonies are used in Enchantments viz. for the begetting this diabolical faith and heightening the fancy to a degree of strength and vigour sufficient to make it a fit instrument for the designed performance And these I think are reasons of likelihood and probability why the hellish confederates are mostly the ignorant and the melancholic To pass then to another prejudice 8 The frequent impostures that are met with in this kind beget in some a belief that all such relations are forgeries and tales and if we urge the evidence of a story for the belief of Witches or Apparitions they will produce two as seemingly strong and plausible which shall conclude in mistake or design inferring thence that all others are of the same quality and credit But such arguers may please to consider 1 That a single relation for an Affirmative sufficiently confirmed and attested is worth a thousand tales of forgery and imposture from whence cannot be concluded an universal negative So that though all the Objectors stories be true and an hundred times as many more such deceptions yet one relation wherein no fallacy or fraud could be suspected for our Affirmative would spoil any Conclusion could be erected on them And 2 It seems to me a belief sufficiently bold and precarious that all these relations of forgery and mistake should be certain and not one in millions of those which attest the affirmative reality with circumstances as good as could be expected or wished should be true but all fabulous and vain And they have no reason to object credulity to the assertors of Sorcery and Witchcraft that can swallow so large a morsel And I desire such Objectors to consider 3 Whether it be fair to infer that because there are some Cheats and Impostures that therefore there are no Realities Indeed frequency of deceit and fallacy will warrant a greater care and caution in examining and scrupulosity and shiness of assent to things wherein fraud hath been practised or may in the least degree be suspected But to conclude because that an old woman's fancy abused her or some knavish fellows put tricks upon the ignorant and the timorous that therefore whole Assizes have been a thousand times deceived in judgements upon matters of fact and numbers of sober persons have been forsworn in things wherein perjury could not advantage them I say such inferences are as void of reason as they are of charity and good manners But it may be suggested further 9 That it cannot be imagined what design the Devil should have in making those solemn compacts since persons of such debauched and irreclaimable dispositions as those with whom he is supposed to confederate are pretty securely his antecedently to the bargain and cannot be more so by it since they cannot put their souls out of possibility of the Divine Grace but by the Sin that is unpardonable or if they could so dispose and give away themselves it will to some seem very unlikely that a great and mighty Spirit should oblige himself to such observances and keep such  to secure the soul of a silly body which 't were odds but it would be His though He put himself to no further trouble than that of his ordinary temptations To which suggestions 't were enough to say that 't is sufficient if the thing be well proved though the design be not known And to argue negatively à fine is very unconclusive in such matters The Laws and affairs of the other world as hath been intimated are vastly differing from those of our Regions and therefore 't is no wonder we cannot judge of their designs when we know nothing of their menages & so little of their natures The ignorant looker-on can't imagine what the Limner means by those seemingly rude lines and scrawls which he intends for the rudiments of a Picture and the Figures of Mathematic Operation are nonsense and dashes at a venture to one uninstructed in Mechanics We are in the dark to one another's purposes and intendments & there are a thousand intrigues in our little matters which will not presently confess their design even to sagacious inquisitors And therefore 't is folly and incogitancy to argue any thing one way or other from the designs of a sort of Being's with whom we so little communicate and possibly we can take no more aim or guests at their projects and designments than the gazing Beasts can do at ours when they see the Traps and Gins that are laid for them but understand nothing what they mean Thus in general But I attempt something more particularly in order to which I must premise that the Devil is a name for a Body Politic in which there are very different Orders and Degrees of Spirits and perhaps in as much variety of place and state as among ourselves so that 't is not one and the same person that makes all the compacts with those abused and seduced Souls but they are divers and those 't is like of the meanest and basest quality in the Kingdom of darkness which being supposed I offer this account of the probable design of those wicked Agents viz. That having none to rule or tyrannize over within the Circle of their own nature and government they affect a proud Empire over us the desire of Dominion and Authority being largely spread through the whole circumference of degenerated nature especially among those whose pride was their original transgression every one of these then desires to get him Vassals to pay him homage and to be employed like Slaves in the services of his lusts and appetites to gratify which desire 't is like enough to be provided & allowed by the constitution of their State and Government that every wicked spirit shall have those Souls as his property and particular servants and attendants whom he can catch in such compacts as those wild Beasts that we can take in hunting are by the allowance of the Law our own and those Slaves that a man hath purchased are his peculiar goods and the vassals of his will Or rather those deluding Fiends are like the seducing fellows we call Spirits who inveigle Children by their false and flattering promises and carry them away to the Plantations of America to be servilly employed there in the works of their own profit and advantage And as those base Agents will humour and flatter the simple unwary Youth till they are on Shipboard and without the reach of those that might rescue them from their hands In like manner the more mischievous Tempter studies to gratify please and accommodate to those he deals with in this kind till death hath launched them into the Deep and they are passed the danger of Prayers Repentance and Endeavours and then He useth them as pleaseth Him This account I think is not unreasonable and 't will fully answer the Objection For though the matter be not as I have conjectured yet 't will suggest a way how it may be conceived which nulls the pretence That the Design is inconceivable But then we are still liable to be questioned 10 how it comes about that those proud and insolent Designers practise in this kind upon so few when one would expect that they should be still trading this way and everywhere be driving on the project which the vileness of men makes so feisable and would so much serve the interest of their lusts To which among other things that might be suggested I return 1 That we are never liable to be so betrayed and abused till by our vile dispositions and tendencies we have forfeited the tutelary care and oversight of the better Spirits which though generally they are our guard and defence against the malice and violence of evil Angels yet it may well enough be thought that sometimes they may take their leave of such as are swallowed up by malice envy and desire of revenge qualities most contrary to their Life and Nature and leave them exposed to the invasion and solicitations of those wicked Spirits to whom such hateful Attributes make them very suitable And if there be particular guardian Angels as 't is not absurd to fancy it may then well be supposed that no man is obnoxious to those projects and attempts but only such whose vile and mischievous natures have driven from them their protecting Genius And against this dereliction to the power of evil spirits 't is likely enough what some affirm that the Royal Psalmist directs that Prayer Psal. 71 9 10. Cast me not off in the time of old age forsake me not when my strength faileth For They that keep my soul as the LXX and the Vulgar Latin Qui custodiunt animam meam they take counsel together saying God hath forsaken him persecute him and take him for there is none to deliver him But I add 2 That 't is very probable that the state wherein they are will not easily permit palpable intercourses between the bad Genii and our nature since 't is like enough that their own Laws and Government do not allow their frequent excursions into this world Or it may with as great probability be supposed that 't is a very hard and painful thing for them to force their thin and tenuious bodies into a visible consistence and such shapes as are necessary for their designs in their correspondencies with Witches For in this action their bodies must needs be exceedingly compressed which cannot be well supposed without a painful sense And this is perhaps a reason why there are so few Apparitions and why appearing Spirits are commonly in such haste to be gone viz. that they may be delivered from the unnatural pressure of their tender Vehicles which I confess holds more in the apparitions of good than of evil Spirits most Relations of this kind describing their discoveries of themselves as very transient though for those the Holy Scripture records there may be peculiar Reasons why they are not so whereas the wicked ones are not altogether so quick and hasty in their Visits The reason of which probably is the great subtlety and tenuity of the bodies of the former which will require far greater degrees of compression and consequently of pain to make them visible whereas the latter are more feculent and gross and so nearer allied to palpable consistencies and more easily reduceable to appearance and visibility At this turn Sir you may perceive that I have again made use of the Platonic Hypothesis That Spirits are Embodied upon which indeed a great part of my Discourse is grounded And therefore I hold myself obliged to a short account of that supposal It seems then to me very probable from the Nature of Sense and Analogy of Nature For 1. We perceive in ourselves that all Sense is caused and excited by motion made in matter And when those motions which convey sensible impressions to the Brain the Seat of Sense are intercepted Sense is lost So that if we suppose Spirits perfectly to be disjoined from all matter 't is not conceivable how they can have the sense of any thing For how material Objects should any way be perceived or felt without vital union with matter 't is not possible to imagine Nor doth it 2. seem suitable to the Analogy of Nature which useth not to make precipitious leaps from one thing to another but usually proceeds by orderly steps and gradations whereas were there no order of Being's between us who are so deeply plunged into the grossest matter and pure unbodied Spirits 't were a mighty jump in Nature Since then the greatest part of the World consists of the finer portions of matter and our own Souls are immediately united unto these 't is infinitely probable to conjecture that the nearer orders of Spirits are vitally joined to such Bodies And so Nature by Degrees ascending still by the more refined and subtle matter gets at last to the pure or immaterial minds which the Platonists made the highest Order of created Being's But of this I have discoursed elsewhere and have said thus much of it at present because it will enable me to add another Reason of the unfrequency of Apparitions and Compacts viz. 3. Because 't is very likely that these Regions are very unsuitable and disproportioned to the frame and temper of their Senses and Bodies so that perhaps the Courser Spirits can no more bear the Air of our World than Batts and Owls can the brightest beams of Day Nor can the Purer and Better any more endure the noisome steams and poisonous reeks of this Dunghill Earth than the Delicate can bear a confinement in nasty Dungeons and the foul squalid Caverns of uncomfortable Darkness So that 't is no more wonder that the better Spirits no oftener appear than that men are not more frequently in the Dark Hollows under ground Nor is' t any more strange that evil Spirits so rarely visit us than that Fishes do not ordinarily fly in the Air as 't is said one sort of them doth or that we see not the Bat daily fluttering in the beams of the Sun And now by the help of what I have spoken under this Head I am provided with some things wherewith to disable another Objection which I thus propose XI If there be such an intercourse between Evil Spirits and the Wicked how comes it about that there is no correspondence between Good Spirits and the Virtuous since without doubt these are as desirous to propagate the Spirit and Designs of the upper and better World as those are to promote the Interest of the Kingdom of Darkness Which way of arguing is still from our Ignorance of the State and Government of the other World which must be confessed and may without prejudice to the Proposition I defend But particularly I say 1. That we have ground enough to believe that Good Spirits do interpose in yea and govern our Affairs For that there is a Providence reaching from Heaven to Earth is generally acknowledged but that this supposeth all things to be ordered by the immediate influence and interposal of the Supreme Deity is not very Philosophical to suppose since if we judge by the Analogy of the Natural World all things we see are carried on by the Ministry of Second Causes and intermediate Agents And it doth not seem so Magnificent and Becoming an apprehension of the Supreme Numen to fancy His immediate Hand in every trivial Management But 't is exceeding likely to conjecture that much of the Government of us and our Affairs is committed to the better Spirits with a due subordination and subserviency to the Will of the chief Rector of the Universe And 't is not absurd to believe that there is a Government runs from Highest to Lowest the better and more perfect orders of Being still ruling the inferior and less perfect So that some one would fancy that perhaps the Angels may manage us as we do the Creatures that God and Nature have placed under our Empire and Dominion But however that is That God rules the lower World by the Ministry of Angels is very consonant to the sacred Oracles Thus Deut. XXXII viij ix When the Most High divided the Nations their inheritance when he separated the sons of Adam he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the Angels of God as the Septuagint renders it the Authority of which Translation is abundantly credited and asserted by its being quoted in the New Testament without notice of the Hebrew Text even there where it differs from it as learned men have observed We know also that Angels were very familiar with the Patriarches of old and Iacob's Ladder is a Mystery which imports their ministering in the affairs of the Lower World Thus Origen and others understand that to be spoken by the Presidential Angels Jer. LI.ix. We would have healed BABYLON but she is not healed forsake her and let us go Like the Voice heard in the Temple before the taking of jerusalem by Titus And before Nabuchadnezzar was sent to learn Wisdom and Religion among the Beasts He sees a Watcher according to the 70. an Angel and an holy One come down from heaven Dan. IU. xiii who pronounceth the sad Decree against Him and calls it the Decree of the Watchers who very probably were the Guardian Genii of Himself and his Kingdom And that there are particular Angels that have the special Rule and Government of particular Kingdoms Provinces Cities yea and of Persons I know nothing that can make improbable The instance is notorious in Daniel of the Angels of Persia and Graecia that hindered the other that was engaged for the concerns of judaea yea our Saviour Himself tells us that Children have their Angels and the Congregation of Disciples supposed that St. Peter had his Which things if they be granted the good Spirits have not so little to do with us and our matters as is generally believed And perhaps it would not be absurd if we referred many of the strange thwarts and unexpected events the disappointments and lucky coincidences that befall us the unaccountable fortunes and successes that attend some lucky men and the unhappy fates that dog others that seem born to be miserable the Fame and Favour that still waits on some without any conceivable motive to allure it and the general neglect of others more deserving whose worth is not acknowledged I say these and such like odd things may with the greatest probability be resolved into the Conduct and Menages of those invisible Supervisors that preside over and govern our affairs But if they so far concern themselves in our matters how is it that they appear not to maintain a visible and confessed correspondence with some of the better Mortals who are most fitted for their Communications and their influence To which I have said some things already when I accounted for the unfrequency of Apparitions and I now add what I intent for another return to the main Objection viz. 2. That the apparition of good Spirits is not needful for the Designs of the better World whatever such may be for the interest of the other For we have had the Appearance and Cohabitation of the Son of God we have Moses and the Prophets and the continued influence of the Spirit the greatest Arguments to strengthen Faith the most powerful Motives to excite our Love and the Noblest Encouragements to quicken and raise our desires and hopes any of which are more than the apparition of an Angel which would indeed be a great gratification of the Animal Life but 't would render our Faith less noble and less generous were it frequently so assisted Blessed are they that believe and yet have not seen Besides which the good Angels have no such ends to prosecute as the gaining any Vassals to serve them they being ministering Spirits for our good and no self-designers for a proud and insolent Dominion over us And it may be perhaps not impertinently added That they are not always evil Spirits that appear as is I know not well upon what grounds generally imagined but that the extraordinary detections of Murders latent Treasures falsified and unfulfilled Bequests which are sometimes made by Apparitions may be the courteous Discoveries of the better and more benign Genii Yea 't is not unlikely that those Warnings that the World sometimes hath of approaching judgements and Calamities by Prodigies and sundry odd Phaenomena are the kind Informations of some of the Inhabitants of the upper World Thus was jerusalem forewarned before its sacking by Antiochus by those Airy Horsemen that were seen through all the City for almost forty days together 2 Mac V. two three And the other Prodigious Portents that foreran its Destruction by Titus which I mention because they are notorious instances And though for mine own part I scorn the ordinary ●ales of Prodigies which proceed from superstitious fears and unacquaintance with Nature and have been used to bad purposes by the jealous and the Ignorant Yet I think that the Arguments that are brought by a late very ingenious Author to conclude against such Warnings and Predictions in the whole kind are short and inconsequent and built upon too narrow Hypothesis For if it be supposed that there is a sort of Spirits over us and about us who can give a probable guess at the more remarkable futurities I know not why it may not be conjectured that the kindness they have for us and the appetite of foretelling strange things and the putting the World upon expectation which we find is very grateful to our own Natures may not incline them also to give us some general notice of those uncommon Events which they foresee And I yet perceive no reason we have to fancy that whatever is done in this kind must needs be either immediately from Heaven or from the Angels by extraordinary commission and appointment But it seems to me not unreasonable to believe that those officious Spirits that oversee our affairs perceiving some mighty and sad alterations at hand in which their Charge is much concerned cannot choose by reason of their affection to us but give us some seasonable hints of those approaching Calamities to which also their natural desire to foretell strange things to come may contribute to incline them And by this Hypothesis the fairest probabilities and strongest ratiotinations against Prodigies may be made unserviceable But this only by the way I proceed to the next Objection which may be made to speak thus XII The belief of Witches and the wonderful things they are said to perform by the help of the Confederate Daemon weakens our Faith and exposeth the World to Infidelity in the great matters of our Religion For if They by Diabolical assistance can inflict and cure Diseases and do things so much beyond the comprehension of our Philosophy and activity of common Nature What assurance can we have that the Miracles that confirm our Gospel were not the effects of a Compact of like nature and that Devils were not cast out by Beelzebub If evil Spirits can assume Bodies and render themselves visible in humane likeness What security can we have of the reality of the Resurrection of Christ And if by their help Witch's can enter Chambers invisibly through Keyholes and little unperceived Cranneys and transform themselves at pleasure What Arguments of Divinity are there in our Saviour's showing himself in the midst of his Disciples when the Doors were shut and his Transfiguration in the Mount Miracles are the great inducements of Belief and How shall we distinguish a Miracle from a Lying Wonder a Testimony from Heaven from a Trick of the Angels of Hell if they can perform things that astonish and confound our Reasons and are beyond all the Possibilities of Humane Nature This Objection is spiteful and mischievous but I thus endeavour to dispatch it 1. The Wonders done by Confederacy with wicked Spirits cannot derive a suspicion upon the undoubted Miracles that were wrought by the Author & Promulgers of our Religion as if they were performed by Diabolical Compact since their Spirit Endeavours and Designs were notoriously contrary to all the Tendencies Aims and Interests of the Kingdom of Darkness For as to the Life and Temper of the Blessed and Adorable JESUS we know there was an incomparable sweetness in his Nature Humility in his Manners Calmness in his Temper Compassion in his Miracles Modesty in his Expressions Holiness in all his Actions Hatred of Vice and Baseness and Love to all the World all which are essentially contrary to the Nature and Constistitution of Apostate Spirits who abound in Pride and Rancour Insolence and Rudeness Tyranny and Baseness universal Malice and Hatred of Men. And their Designs are as opposite as their Spirit and their Genius And now Can the Sun borrow its Light from the bottomless Abyss Can Heat and Warmth flow in upon the World from the Regions of Snow and Ice Can Fire freeze and Water burn Can Natures so infinitely contrary communicate and jump in projects that are destructive to each others known Interests Is there any Balsam in the Cockatrice's Egg or Can the Spirit of Life flow from the Venom of the Asp Will the Prince of Darkness strengthen the Arm that is stretched out to pluck his Usurped Sceptre and his Spoils from him And will he lend his Legions to assist the Armies of his Enemy against him No these are impossible Supposals No intelligent Being will industriously and knowingly contribute to the Contradiction of its own Principles the Defeature of its Purposes and the Ruin of its own dearest Interests There is no fear then that our Faith should receive prejudice from the acknowledgement of the Being of Witches and power of evil Spirits since 't is not the doing wonderful things that is the only Evidence that the Holy JESUS was from God and his Doctrine true but the conjunction of other circumstances the holiness of his Life the reasonableness of his Religion and the excellency of his Designs added credit to his Works and strengthened the great Conclusion That he could be no other than the Son of God and Saviour of the World But besides I say 2. That since infinite Wisdom and Goodness rules the World it cannot be conceived that they should give up the greatest part of men to unavoidable deception And if evil Angels by their Confederates are permitted to perform such astonishing things as seem so evidently to carry God's Seal and Power with them for the confirmation of Falsehoods and gaining credit to Impostors without any counter-evidence to disabuse the World Mankind is exposed to sad and fatal delusion And to say that Providence will suffer us to be deceived in things of the greatest concernment when we use the best of our care and endeavours to prevent it is to speak hard things of God and in effect to affirm That He hath nothing to do in the Government of the World or doth not concern Himself in the affairs of poor forlorn Men. And if the Providence and Goodness of God be not a security unto us against such Deceptions we cannot be assured but that we are always abused by those mischievous Agents in the Objects of plain sense and in all the matters of our daily Converses If ONE that pretends he is immediately sent from God to overthrow the ancient Fabric of Established Worship and to erect a New Religion in His Name shall be born of a Virgin and honoured by a miraculous Star proclaimed by a Song of seeming Angels of Light and Worshipped by the wise Sages of the World Revered by those of the greatest austerity and admired by all for a miraculous Wisdom beyond his Education and his Years If He shall feed Multitudes with almost nothing and fast himself beyond all the possibilities of Nature If He shall be transformed into the appearance of extraordinary Glory and converse with departed Prophets in their visible Forms If He shall Cure all Diseases without Physic or Endeavour and raise the Dead to Life after they have stunk in their Graves If He shall be honoured by Voices from Heaven and attract the universal Wonder of Princes and People If he shall allay Tempests with a Beck and cast out Devils with a Word If He shall foretell his own Death particularly with its Tragical Circumstances and his Resurrection after it If the Veil of the most Famous Temple in the World shall be rend and the Sun darkened at his Funeral If He shall within the time foretell break the bonds of Death and lift up his Head out of the Grave If Multitudes of other departed Souls shall arise with Him to attend at the Solemnity of His Resurrection If He shall after Death visibly converse with eat and drink with divers persons who could not be deceived in a matter of clear sense and ascend in Glory in the presence of an astonished and admiring Multitude I say if such a One as this should prove a Diabolical Impostor and Providence should permit him to be so credited and acknowledged What possibility were there then for us to be assured that we are not always deceived yea that our very Faculties were not given us only to delude and abuse us And if so the next Conclusion is That there is no God that judgeth in the Earth and the best and most likely Hypothesis will be That the World is given up to the Government of the Devils But if there be a Providence that superviseth us as nothing is more certain doubtless it will never suffer poor helpless Creatures to be inevitably deceived by the craft and subtlety of their mischievous Enemy to their undoing but will without question take such care that the works wrought by Divine Power for the Confirmation of Divine Truth shall have such visible Marks and Signatures if not in their Nature yet in their Circumstances Ends and Designs as shall discover whence they are and sufficiently distinguish them from all Impostures and Delusions And though wicked Spirits may perform some strange things that may excite wonder for a while yet He hath and will so provide that they shall be baffled and discredited as we know it was in the case of Moses and the Egyptian Magicians Now besides what I have directly said to the Objection I have this to add to the Objectors That I could wish they would take care of such Suggestions which if they overthrew not the Opinion they oppose will dangerously affront the Religion they would seem to acknowledge For he that saith That if there are WITCHES there is no way to prove that Christ jesus was a Magician and Diabolical Impostor puts a deadly Weapon into the hands of the Infidel and is himself next door to the SIN AGAINST THE HOLY GHOST of which in order to the persuading greater tenderness and caution in such matters I give this short account The Sin against the Holy Ghost is said to be Unpardonable by which sad Attribute and the Discourse of our Saviour Mat. XII from the xxii to the xxxiii ver we may understand its Nature In order to which we consider That since the Mercies of God and the Merits of his Son are infinite there is nothing can make a Sin unpardonable but what makes it incurable and there is no Sin but what is curable by a strong Faith and a vigorous Endeavour For all things are possible to him that believeth So that that which makes a Sin incurable must be somewhat that makes Faith impossible and obstructs all means of Conviction In order to the finding which we must consider the ways and methods the Divine Goodness hath taken for the begetting Faith and cure of Infidelity which it at●●●ted first by the Prophets and holy men 〈…〉 times who by the excellency of their 〈…〉 the greatness of their Miracles and the 〈…〉 of their Lives endeavoured the conviction and reformation of a stubborn and unbelieving World But though Few believed their report and men would not be prevailed on by wha 〈…〉 they said yet their Infidelity 〈…〉 incurable because further mean● were provided in the Ministry of john the Baptist whose Life was more severe whose Doctrines were more plain pressing and particular and therefore 't was possible that He might have succeeded Yea and where He failed and could not open men's hearts and their eyes the Effect was still in possibility and it might be expected from Him that came after to whom the Prophets and john were but the Twilight and the Dawn And though His miraculous Birth the Song of Angels the journey of the Wise Men of the East and the correspondence of Prophecies with the Circumstances of the first appearance of the Wonderful Infant I say though these had not been taken notice of yet was there a further provision made for the cure of Infidelity in his astonishing Wisdom and most excellent Doctrines For He spoke as never Man did And when These were despised and neglected yet there were other means towards reviviction and Cure of Unbelief in those mighty Works that bore Testimony of Him and w●●● the evident marks of Divine Power in their foreheads But when after all these ●lear and unquestionable Miracles which were wrought by the Spirit of God and had eminently his Superscription on them shall be ascribed 〈…〉 the Agency of evil Spirits and Diabolical compact as they were by the malicious and spiteful Pharisees in the periods  when those great and last Testimonies against Infidelity shall be said to be but the Tricks of Sorcery and Complotment with Hellish Confederates This is Blasphemy in the higest against the Power and Spirit of God and such as cuts off all means of Conviction and puts the Unbeliever beyond all possibilities of Cure For Miracles are God's Seal and the great and last evidence of the truth of any Doctrine And though while these are only disbelieved as to the Fact there remains a possibility of persuasion yet when the Fact shall be acknowledged but the Power blasphemed and the effects of the adorable Spirit maliciously imputed to the Devils such a Blasphemy such an Infidelity is incurable and consequently unpardonable I say in sum the Sin against the Holy Ghost to be a malicious imputation of the Miracles by the Spirit of God in our Saviour 〈…〉 Confederacy and the power of Apo Spirits Than which nothing is more 〈…〉 and nothing is more like to pro the Holy Spirit that is so abused to an Eternal Dereliction of so Vile and so Incurable an Unbeliever 〈…〉 't is clear and reasonable in itself 〈…〉 lodged in the mentioned Discourse of our Saviour And those that speak other things about it seem to me to talk at random and perfectly without book But to leave them to the fondness of their own conceits I think it now time to draw up to a Conclusion of the whole Therefore briefly Sir I have endeavoured in these Papers which my respect and your concernment in the subject have made yours to remove the main prejudices I could think of against the existence of Witches and Apparitions and I 'm sure I have suggested much more against what I defend than ever I heard or saw in any that opposed it whose Discourses for the most part have seemed to me inspired by a lofty scorn of common belief and some trivial Notions of Vulgar Philosophy And in despising the Common Faith about matters of Fact and fond adhering to it in things of 〈…〉 they very grossly and absurdly mistake● things of Fact the People are as much 〈…〉 lieved as the most subtle 〈…〉 culators since here Sense is the Judge in matters of Notions and Theory Th● are not at all to be heeded because Reason is to be Judge of these and this they known not how to use And yet thus it is with the 〈…〉 that will deny the plain 〈…〉 Sense● of Mankind because they can not 〈…〉 appearances with the fond Crotc●●●● of a Philosophy which they lighted on in the Highway by chance and will adhere to at adventure So that I profess for mine own part I never yet heard any of the confident Declaimers against Witchcraft and Apparitions speak any thing that might move a mind in any degree instructed in the generous kinds of Philosophy and Nature of things And for the Objections I have recited they are such as rise out of mine own thoughts which I obliged to consider what was possible to be said upon this occasion For though I have examined Scot's Discovery phancying that there I should find the strong reasons of men's disbelief in this matter yet I profess I met not with the least suggestion in all that Farrago but what it had been ridiculous for me to have gone about answer For the Author doth little but tell 〈…〉 and silly Legends which he confutes and laugh● at and pretends this to be a Confutation of the Being of Witches and Apparitions which His Reasonings are trifling and Childish and when He ventures at Philosophy He is little better than absurd So that 't will be a Wonder to me if any but Boys and Buffoons imbibe any Prejudices against a Belief so infinitely Confirmed from the Lose and Impotent Suggestions of so weak a Discourser And now Sir 't is fit that I relieve your patience and I shall do so when I have said that You can abundantly prove what I have but attempted to defend And that among the many Obligations your Country hath to you for the Wisdom and Diligence of your Endeavours in its service your Ingenious Industry for the Detecting of those Vile Practisers is not the least considerable To which I will add no more but the Confession who it is that hath given you all this trouble which I know you are ready to pardon to the respect and good Intentions of SIR Your Affectionate 〈…〉 I G.