DECEMBER 287 



indeed an appalling one : you are to take the head of a 

 mad dog, pound it, mix it with wine, and drink it. 



It is sad to think that in the centuries since Pliny and 

 Lucian mocked at the Magi all this rubbish had been 

 allowed to accumulate and impede the ascent of man. 

 The work had all to be done over again. Pliny had 

 declared that of all earthly systems the doctrines of the 

 Magi were the most fraudulent not stupid, but fraudu- 

 lent; yet even he inclined to believe that the popular 

 notion could not be altogether groundless, that a man by 

 eating roast hare improved his looks for nine days. ' Born a 

 goddess, dulness never dies.' Be assured, it is far from dead 

 yet. It lurks in privy places, waiting for some dislocation 

 of our prodigious progress, some clouding of our splendid 

 enlightenment, to spread its pall upon our faculties. 



Sometimes one comes on a sample of it when least 

 expecting anything of the sort. The turf is hardly 

 firm above the grave of a certain man (one of the most 

 intelligent and upright of his class that I ever knew) 

 who once recommended me, as a cure for sty in the 

 eye, to gather nine thorns from a gooseberry bush, burn 

 eight of them to ashes, and prick the sty with the ninth. 

 In another instance, which happened in my own parish 

 within the last five-and- twenty years, may be recognised 

 that principle of propitiation by sacrifice which lies at the 

 base of all religion and its corruption superstition. A 

 certain farmer very well known to me, whose social stand- 

 ing may be understood from the fact that he was an elder 

 of the kirk and paid about 300 a year in rent, wishing to 

 rid his cattle of the disease known as ' blackleg,' caused a 

 calf or stirk to be buried alive. Many persons were present 

 at the ceremony, including the local veterinary surgeon ! 



