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Mompesson, and required more clear and positive evidence than they, or whether the powers with which they were armed to punish anybody who might be found carrying on this deception, frightened the evil-doers, is not certain; but Glanvil himself reluctantly confesses, that all the time they were in the house, the noises ceased, and nothing was heard or seen.
Just a century later, Glanvil, one of the most eminent men of his day, and Henry More, the Platonist, whose memory is still dear to the lovers of an imaginative mysticism, were perfectly satisfied with evidence like that which follows. Elizabeth Styles confessed, in 1664, "that the Devil about ten years since appeared to her in the shape of a handsome Man, and after of a black Dog.
Joseph Glanvil, "it made a mighty noise; and a servant, observing two boards in the children's room seeming to move, he bid it give him one of them. The man added, 'Nay, let me have it in my hand; upon which the spirit, devil, or drummer pushed it towards him so close, that he might touch it. "This," continues Glanvil, "was in the day-time, and was seen by a whole room full of people.
Writing like this, when it finds eager readers, is a sign that the weather is changing; yet much later, namely, after 1665, when the Royal Society had been founded, our own Glanvil, the author of the “Scepsis Scientifica,” a work that was a remarkable advance toward the true definition of the limits of inquiry, and that won him his election as fellow of the society, published an energetic vindication of the belief in witchcraft, of which Mr. Lecky gives the following sketch: “The ‘Sadducismus Triumphatus,’ which is probably the ablest book ever published in defence of the superstition, opens with a striking picture of the rapid progress of the scepticism in England. Everywhere, a disbelief in witchcraft was becoming fashionable in the upper classes; but it was a disbelief that arose entirely from a strong sense of its antecedent improbability. All who were opposed to the orthodox faith united in discrediting witchcraft. They laughed at it, as palpably absurd, as involving the most grotesque and ludicrous conceptions, as so essentially incredible that it would be a waste of time to examine it. This spirit had arisen since the Restoration, although the laws were still in force, and although little or no direct reasoning had been brought to bear upon the subject. In order to combat it, Glanvil proceeded to examine the general question of the credibility of the miraculous. He saw that the reason why witchcraft was ridiculed was, because it was a phase of the miraculous and the work of the devil; that the scepticism was chiefly due to those who disbelieved in miracles and the devil; and that the instances of witchcraft or possession in the Bible were invariably placed on a level with those that were tried in the law courts of England. That the evidence of the belief was overwhelming, he firmly believed; and this, indeed, was scarcely disputed; but, until the sense of
A grand jury presented the drummer for trial, on a charge of witchcraft, but the petty jury would not convict, there being a want of evidence to prove threats, malum minatum, by the drummer. In 1662 the Rev. Joseph Glanvil, F.R.S., visited the house, and, in the bedroom of Mr.
Pepys found it "not very convincing". Glanvil, in consequence of his book, was so vexed by correspondents "that I have been haunted almost as bad as Mr. Mompesson's house". A report that imposture had been discovered, and confessed by Mr. Mompesson, was set afloat, by John Webster, in a well-known work, and may still be found in modern books.
Casaubon and Glanvil, who wrote so much later, treat Scot with profound contempt, assuring us his reasonings are childish, and his philosophy absurd! Such was the reward of a man of genius combating with popular prejudices! Even so late as 1687, these popular superstitions were confirmed by the narrations and the philosophy of Glanvil, Dr. More, &c.
The spiritual whistle is familiar to Glanvil and to Homer. Mr. Wesley, at Epworth , noted it among all the other phenomena. The Mrarts are next heard 'jumping down, like the kenaimas. Questions are put to them, and they answer. They decline, very naturally, to approach a bright fire. This binding is customary among the Eskimo, and, as Mr.
Second sight, the fairy world, ghosts, 'wraiths, 'astral bodies' of witches whose bodies of flesh are elsewhere, volatile chairs and tables, all were spoken of by witches under torture, and by sworn witnesses. Resisting the scepticism of the Restoration, Glanvil, More, Boyle, and the rest, fought the Sadducee with the usual ghost stories.
Glanvil denied it till he was "quite tired," and Mompesson gave a formal denial in a letter dated Tedworth, 8th November, 1672. He also, with many others, swore to the facts on oath, in court, at the drummer's trial. In the Tedworth case, as at Epworth, and in the curious Cideville case of 1851, a quarrel with "cunning men" preceded the disturbances. In Lord St.
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