7 8 bh Popular Uluftonh 



only from Mercato's grandfon. Bayle obfervcs*,' 

 it was very unfortunate that Mercato did not 

 make affidavit of the apparition, before a proper 

 magiftrate. Lord Clarendon's ftory is quite 

 deflitute of fupport, being a compound of hearfay 

 ind conjedure. The curious affair of the: dif- 

 turbances in Cock-lane, never thoroughly be- 

 lieved, and never clearly detected, added no 

 ftrength to the do£trine of apparitions, but fur- 

 nifhed another proof, that neither the force of" 

 natural talents, nor the helps of acquired know- 

 ledge, can eradicate the general difpofition to the 

 engaging horrors of fupernatural agency. Ven- 

 triloquifm was talked of in this inftance, but can 

 only be regarded as a ftill greater abfurdity(Q^). 

 Some of the bed authenticated hiftories of 

 apparitions, however, carry their own detection 

 with them,- in the abfurdities eftablilhed by their 

 evidence. In Baxter's World of Spirits, for ex- 

 ample, there is a copious narrative of the dif- 

 turbances at Llanellin, in Glamorganfhire, con- 

 firmed by concurrent teflimonies of fufficient 

 witnefles, with this circumftance among the reft; 

 that oft-times the Jhudow of a perfon walking 

 would be vifible on the wall, while no fubftance 

 capable of intercepting the fun's rays was fen- 

 fibly prefent in that place. This is a phyfical 

 :£bfurdity, and cannot be true. But what Ih'all 



* Did. Art. Bon«. 



we 



