50 THE NEW SCIENCE AND ENGLISH LITERATURE 



was to reconcile that belief with the new demand for a reasonable 

 and natural explanation, and at the same time keep in harmony 

 with orthodox theology. Writing in the language of the new 

 philosophy and especially of Descartes, he declared that "the best 

 way to attain true knowledge is to suspend the giving our con 

 firmed assent to those Receptions, till we have looked them over 

 by an impartial inquiry; to reckon of them all as false, or uncer 

 tain, till we have examined them by a free and unpossest Reason; 

 and to admit nothing but what we see clearly and distinctly per 

 ceive." 105 This is in perfect accord with the "free philosophy " 

 of the time ; a ' ' free and unpossest Reason ' ' in search of truth in 

 natural phenomena was the fundamental principle of the new 

 science. This principle guided Glanvil confidently on to a cer 

 tain point, where it met its old enemies, accepted beliefs and in 

 herited prejudices. Further than this Glanvil's mind could not 

 go. That point marked the dividing line between the free play 

 of "unpossest Reason " and theological faith. "Now after all 

 this, it will be requisite for me to add, that I intend not these 

 Remarques in favor of any Conceits in Theology, to gain Credit to 

 such by disparaging Antiquity; No, here the old Paths are un 

 doubtedly best, quod verum id prius: And I put as much differ 

 ence between the pretended New Lights, and old Truths, as I 

 do between the Sun and an Evanid Meteor; Though I confess, in 

 Philosophy I am a seeker ". 106 But a seeker who blind-folds him 

 self before he begins an investigation of certain problems will sure 

 ly break his shins upon some sharp-cornered inconsistency. And 

 so it was with Glanvil. 



In Essay VI, Upon Witches and Apparitions, he prefaced the 

 whole discussion by a statement of his attitude that virtually begged 

 the question, and was certainly inconsistent with his "vanity of 

 dogmatizing ". "If anything were to be much admired in an Age 

 of Wonders, not only of Nature, (which is a constant Prodigy) 

 but of men and manners; it would be to me matter of astonish 

 ment, that men, otherwise witty and ingenious, are fallen into the 

 Conceit that there's no such thing as a Witch or Apparition, but 

 that these are creatures of Melancholy and Superstition, fostered by 



** Essay I, p. 22. 

 Essay I, p. 28. 



