aG4 
murders have received a fancied fanétion 
from the icripture ftory of the witeh of 
Endor ! : 
T have fometimes heen half inclined to 
think that I had difcovered the origi in of 
the popular notions concerning witches, 
wizards, and fairies. 
Concerning witches and wizards, al- 
moft all the vulgar opinions and tales pres 
valent among chriftians, have, doubtlefs, 
originated from hints thrown out in the 
holy feriptures. What was accounted 
witchcraft among the ancient Hraelites, 
feems to have been, a remnant of the my{f- 
teries of fome fuperftition which had 
been anciently pre evalent in the land, or 
had been recentiy introduced into it, but 
which was profcribed by the laws of the 
fate, and was cherifhed only in fecret, 
and under ftrong fears of detection and 
punifhment. It does not certainly ap- 
pear, that any people ever fet themtelves, 
knowingly, and directly, to cultivate the 
good graces of the devil, as fuck, in con- 
temot of the favour of sclhérte! and more 
powerful divinity. But, it was fufh- 
ciently natural to reprefent, as the wor- 
fhip of the devil, any fecret worthip of 
Gods, not pee nnrdieed by the ftate, nor 
generally known inthe country. Thefe 
ideas, having been once conceived concern- 
ang fuch fecret worfhip, could hardly fail 
to maintain aod propagate themfelves, 
nay, evento give, at Peese a new tone 
to the fpirit of Lee worfhip which was 
the fubject of them. _ One thing that 
confiderably diGimpuithes conjuration and 
witchcraft from other practices and forms 
of fuperftition is, that the agents in them 
have pretended to have, by one means or 
another, attained to a commanding ir- 
refiftible authority over the powers to 
whee they were wont to addrels them- 
felves. This SUDO is fi uppofed to 
have been attained, by cornet ft1 ipu- 
lating peace conditia by the in- 
terpofition of feme fuperior aaa. con- 
ferring a fway over the meaner demons ; 
or by the offering of fome facrifices, fa 
irefiftibly grateful to, the appetites of the 
beings whofe fervices are wanted, that 
they are abfolutely unable to bras ae 
prefence and aid. I[t wereeafy to trac 
thefe fancies te their origin in the fenti 
ments of nature. Conjuration and witch- 
craft were known alfoto theGreeks and 
Romans. Pontus and Theflaly were the 
regions from which thefe nations derived 
‘their rites of conjuration. The fyftem of 
witchcraft, which has been received among 
chriftians, exhibits a fort of medley of 
that of the Jews, with that of the Greeks 
Help for Weitk Sight.... On T, 
{ May 
and Romans. It has been, no doubt, in 
the Japte ot fo ‘any centuries, variegated 
and improved by the differing manners of 
different ages, and bya genius and in- 
duftry of the long fucceffion of perfons 
who-have fancied then:felves witches or 
wizards. Witchcrait is Hkely to be 
very foon reduced into the fituation of 
thote jo arts of vehich the genius of a 
Pancirolo or a Dutens is required to” 
recognize the very exiftences I fear for 
poor Satan, that, if he ceafe to roam the 
earth, and to deal with old women, men 
may icon prefume to deny him any being 
at all. 
Fairies are, in the conception of our 
ruftics, beings of avery various chara€ter. 
Sometimes they are little tiny forms ; 
]i ght, airy, gay, and clad im green ; Be 
ride nimbly threugh the air, or danced in 
feftive {port, on earth; and who, though 
they may occationally. exercile little teiz- 
ing pranks upon mankind, yet re- 
ard them with nv ferious malignity ; and 
by their kindneffes to the deferving, more 
than compenfate the little ills they do to 
the fluttifh, the idle, and the undeferving. 
In cther cafes, they are confidered as 
malicious fprites, who owe a human 
being, as a fepten nary victim, to the 
devil, and who therefore occafionally 
carry infants away, to be devoted to this 
fate. At times, tco, they are reprefented, 
as having a to guide the winds, te 
fwell ae billows of the ocean, to darken 
the earth with clouds, to launch. the 
lichtnings, and to excite the thunders’ 
Often are they {aid to 
‘itcheraft, (Fe. 
fps 
1€€ 
loudeit roar. 
inveigle mankind into compacts, fuch as 
prove in the end fatally rumous to the 
everlatting welfare of the unhappy wretches 
who are thus enticed into their fares. 
Now thefe beings, to whom fuch vari- 
ous powers and fo many incongruous at- 
tributes-have been vulgarly afcribed, ap- 
pear to me to be the genuine reprofentatames 
of a mingled and very numerous hoft of the 
divinities of ancient polytheifin, and even of 
the faints of the dark ages of chriftianity. 
The fpirits cf Offian, inhabiting the airy 
hails oF the clouds ; the deities warthiee 
ped by Druiditin ; the rural divinities of 
the Greeks and Romans 5 with fome part 
of the powers of the old Scandinavian ~ 
mythology ; are afiuredly affociated in 
one contufed affemblage, in the common 
notions of our Britith ‘ruttics, concerning 
thofe beings which they call fairies: I 
fufpect the faints of Popith chriftianity to 
be mingled in the fame multitude ; for the 
eve of the feftival of all the foie is one 
on which the fairies are believed to fwarm 
about, 
