SYLVA 219 



were generally consecrated by Faunus) that they boldly 

 set up his oracles and responses in these nemorous 

 places : Hence the heathen chappels had the name of 

 fana, and from their wild and extravagant religion, 

 the professors of it fanatics ; a name well becoming 

 some of our late enthusiasts amongst us ; who, when 

 their quaking fits possess them, resemble the giddy 

 motion of trees, whose heads are agitated with every 

 wind of doctrine. 



7. Here we may not omit what learned men have 

 observ'd concerning the custom of prophets and 

 persons inspir'd of old, to sleep upon the boughs and 

 branches of trees ; I do not mean on the tops of them, 

 (as the salvages somewhere do in the Indies for fear 

 of wild beasts in the night-time) but on matrasses 

 and beds made of their leaves, ad consulendum^ to ask 

 advice of God. Naturalists tell us, that the laurus^ 

 and agnus castus were trees which greatly compos'd 

 the fancy, and did facilitate true visions ; and that the 

 first was specially efficacious TT/OOC rove evflovtnao-^oue, (as 

 my author expresses it) to inspire a poetical fury: 1 

 Such a tradition there goes of Rebekah the wife of 

 Isaac, in imitation of her father-in-law : The instance 

 is recited out of an ancient ecclesiastical history by 

 Abulensis; 2 and (what I drive at) that from hence the 

 Delphic Tripos^ the Dodonasan oracle in Epirus, and 

 others of that nature had their originals : At this 

 decubation upon boughs the satyrist seems to hint, 

 where he introduces the gypsies : 



3 With fear 



A cheating Jewess whispers in her ear, 



1 See Fulgent. Mythol. cap. 13. & Munsherum in Comment. 



2 See Hier. in Trad. Heb. 3 Reg. c. 4. 



3 Arcanam ludaea tremens mendicat in aurem, 

 Interpres legum Solymarum, & magna sacerdos 

 Arboris, ac summi fida internuntia caeli. Juv. Sat. 6. 



