yo On Popular Illufions. 



all magical operations was afcribed to the 

 innate confidence of the magician*. It was 

 a common queftion among philofophers, in the 

 laft century, jyhether the imagination could 

 move external objed^s, generally decided in the 

 affirmative J the reality of demoniacal aflion, (the 

 refult of fimple intelligence) was one of the 

 ilrongeft reafons for this determination. The 

 wits might be expeded to divert themfelve^ 

 with this cnithufiaftic philofophy : accordingly 

 Ariofto reckons magical purfuits among thofc 

 ^vhich prove deftruftive to reafon j 



Altri in amor lo perde, altri in Ooori; 

 Altri in cercar, fcorrendo il mar, richezze ; 

 Altri ne le Speranze di Signori ; 

 Altri dietro a le magiche fciocchezze. 



Cant. XXXIV. S. 85. 



Rabelais makes very free with Agrippa's philo- 

 fophical charafter, under the ludicrous name 

 of Her Ttippaj and in theEpiftolasObfcuroruni 

 Virorum, Ortuinus is made to retail fome of the 

 moft ridiculous conceits that have found their 

 way into magical books. But the moft formi- 

 dable enemy to thofe doftrines was our own 

 Butler, who bent fuch a forc^ of ridicule againft 

 them, as expelled them entirely from the higher 



* By Paracelfus, (after Ppmponatius and the Arabian 

 jphyficians) Lord Verulam, Sylv. Sylvar, p. zo6, and 

 Fien. de Virib. Imaginat. p, 59, 



ranks 



