United States or Turkey ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Quite as extraordinary and as cleverly managed was the trick played off at Tedworth, in 1661, at the house of Mr. Mompesson, and which is so circumstantially narrated by the Rev. Joseph Glanvil, under the title of "The Demon of Tedworth," and appended, among other proofs of witchcraft, to his noted work, called "Sadducismus Triumphatus." About the middle of April, in the year above mentioned, Mr.
This edition was dedicated to Charles, Duke of Richmond and Lenox, since His Grace had been "pleased to commend the first and more imperfect Edition." Sadducismus Triumphatus, Preface, F 3 verso, F 4; see also p. 10. In the second part see Preface, Aa 2 Aa 3. In several other places he has insisted upon this point. See ibid., 9 ff., 18 ff., 21 ff., 34 ff. Ibid., 32, 34. Ibid., 11-13.
Ibid., 309. Cal. St. P., Dom., 1671, 105, 171. We have two accounts of this affair: Strange and Wonderful News from Yowell in Surry , and An Account of the Tryal and Examination of Joan Buts . Roger North, op. cit., 131-132. York Depositions, 247. York Depositions, 112, 113. Drage, Daimonomageia, 12. For an account of her case, see Glanvill, Sadducismus Triumphatus, pt. ii, 127-146.
Among the marvels of Glanvil's and other tracts usually published together in his 'Sadducismus Triumphatus' will be found letters which show that he and his friends, like Henry More and Boyle, laboured to collect first-hand evidence for second sight, haunted houses, ghosts, and wraiths.
FOOTNOTES: [B] Glanvill's "Sadducismus Triumphatus," a most instructive and entertaining contribution to the literature of witchcraft. Contemporary opinion of Glanvill is well expressed in Anthony
In this it is confessed that he entirely failed; though he wrought a few miracles of healing among rural invalids. To meet this fragrant and miraculous Conformist, Lady Conway invited men worthy of the privilege, such as the Rev. Joseph Glanvill, F.R.S., the author of Sadducismus Triumphatus, his friend Dr. Henry More, the Cambridge Platonist, and other persons interested in mystical studies.
In this edition the work took the new title A Blow at Modern Sadducism, and it was republished again in 1681 with further additions as Sadducismus Triumphatus, which might be translated "Unbelief Conquered." The work continued to be called for faster than the publisher could supply the demand, and went through several more revisions and reimpressions.
London: Printed by I.M. and are to be sold by the booksellers in London. 1677. Sadducismus Triumphatus: or Full and Plain Evidence concerning Witches and Apparitions. In two Parts. The First treating of their Possibility; the Second of their Real Existence. By Joseph Glanvil, late Chaplain in Ordinary to His Majesty, and Fellow of the Royal Society. The third edition.
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
Joseph Glanvill turned fiercely upon him with new proofs of what he called facts, and bequeathed the work at his death to Henry More, who in the several following editions of the Sadducismus Triumphatus attacked him with no little bitterness. We may skip over three lesser writers on witchcraft.
Word Of The Day