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NATURAL HISTORY. 



the like. Whatsoever is of this kind would be 

 throughly inquired. Trials likewise would be made 

 upon plants, and that diligently : as if you should 

 tell a man, that such a tree would die this year ; and 

 will him at these and these times to go unto it, to 

 see how it thriveth. As for inanimate things, it is true 

 that the motions of shuffling of cards, or casting of 

 dice, are very light motions : and there is a folly 

 very usual, that gamesters imagine, that some that 

 stand by them bring them ill luck. There would be 

 trial also made, of holding a ring by a thread in a 

 glass, and telling him that holdeth it, before, that it 

 shall strike so many times against the side of the 

 glass, and no more ; or of holding a key between two 

 men s fingers, without a charm ; and to tell those 

 that hold it, that at such a name it shall go off their 

 fingers ; for these two are extreme light motions. 

 And howsoever I have no opinion of these things, 

 yet so much I conceive to be true ; that strong ima 

 gination hath more force upon things living, or that 

 have been living, than things-merely inanimate : and 

 more force likewise upon light and subtile motions, 

 than upon motions vehement or ponderous. 



958. It is an usual observation, that if the body 

 of one murdered be brought before the murderer, 

 the wounds will bleed afresh. Some do affirm, that 

 the dead body, upon the presence of the murderer, 

 hath opened the eyes ; and that there have been such 

 like motions, as well where the parties murdered 

 have been strangled or drowned, as where they have 

 been killed by wounds. It may be, that this parti- 



