508 NATURAL HISTORY. 



the spirits of men and living creatures : and with this 

 last we will only meddle. 



The problem therefore is, whether a man con 

 stantly and strongly believing that such a thing shall 

 be, as that such an one will love him, or that such 

 an one will grant him his request, or that such an 

 one shall recover a sickness, or the like, it doth help 

 any thing to the effecting of the thing itself. And 

 here again we must warily distinguish ; for it is 

 not meant, as hath been partly said before, that it 

 should help by making a man more stout, or more 

 industrious, in which kind a constant belief doth 

 much, but merely by a secret operation, or binding, 

 or changing the spirit of another : and in this it is 

 hard, as we began to say, to make any new experi 

 ment ; for I cannot command myself to believe what 

 I will, and so no trial can be made. Nay, it is worse; 

 for whatsoever a man imagineth doubtingly, or with 

 fear, must needs do hurt, if imagination have any 

 power at all ; for a man represented! that oftener 

 that he feareth, than the contrary. 



The help therefore is, for a man to work by 

 another, in whom he may create belief, and not by 

 himself; until himself have found by experience, that 

 imagination doth prevail ; for then experience-work- 

 eth in himself belief ; if the belief that such a thing- 

 shall be, be joined with a belief that his imagination 

 may procure it. 



946. For example : I related one time to a man 

 that was curious and vain enough in these things, that 

 I saw a kind of juggler, that had a pair of cards, and 



