[1] "De Prestigiis Demonum et Incantationibus ac Veneficiis," 1564.
[2] Webster notices the popular delusions of the country people in
the following passage, in which he is speaking of a sound judgment as
necessary to a competent witness:--"They ought to be of a sound
judgment, and not of a vitiated and distempered phantasie, nor of a
melancholic constitution; for these will take a bush to be a bugbear,
and a black sheep to be a demon; the noise of the wild swans, flying
high in the night, to be spirits--or, as they call them here in the
north, _Gabriel Ratchets_; the calling of a daker hen, in the meadow,
to be the _whistlers_; the howling of the female fox in a gill or
clough for the male, to be the cry of fairies." "The _Gabriel
Ratchets_," in our author's time, seem to have been the same with the
German _Rachtvogel_, or _Rachtraven_. The word and the superstition
are well known in Lancashire, though in a sense somewhat different;
for the _Gable-Rachets_ are supposed to be something like litters of
puppies yelping (gabbling) in the air. _Ratch_ is certainly a dog in
general.
The _whistlers_ are the green or whistling plovers, which fly very
high in the night uttering their characteristic note.--Whitaker's
"History of Whalley."
[3] In a correspondence I have read between Dr. More and one of his
enthusiastic disciples, the Rev. Edmund Elys, the letters usually
turn on the reality of apparitions and magical incantations; both
these learned men were hunting about all their lifetimes to find a
true ghost. Elys often breaks out in triumph that he has at length
discovered an authentic ghost; in subsequent letters the evidence
gradually diminishes, and finally the apparition and evidence vanish
together. The following pious doubts, addressed to the philosophic
More, may amuse the reader:--
"Most honoured dear Sir,
"I should be troublesome to you if I did not repress many strong
inclinations to write to you, for I do not take greater comfort in
anything than in the thoughts of _you_ and the _notions_ you have
communicated to the world.
"I now entreat you to tell me one of your arguments why this act is
unlawfull, viz., to inquire by this black art (as I am sure it is,
though I am told some preachers allow it), whether such or such a
_suspected person_ has stolen a thing; viz., by putting a key into
the midst of a Bible, and clasping or tying the Bible on it, and then
hanging the key upon some man's finger put into the hollow of the
handle; and then one of the company saying these words--Ps. 1. 19,
20, 'When thou a thief dost see,' &c., to these words, 'To use that
life most vile.' If the Bible turn upon the finger (holding it by the
key) when such or such a person is named, then he is judged to be the
thief. Some persons that dined at the same table with me had an
humour to try this trick. I declared it was very _wicked_, &c., but,
however, they would do it. And a gentleman of great acquaintance in
the world said that a learned divine asserted it was no hurt, &c. I
thought it might not be a sin for me to stay in the room, after I had
made that profession of my dissent, &c. They tried what would be
done; and, upon the naming of one or two, the key did not move, but
on the naming of one (who afterwards was known to be an accomplice in
the theft) the Bible turned on the finger very plainly in the sight
of divers persons, myself being one. The gentleman that was most
eager to have the _experiment_ holds that there never were any
_apparitions_, &c. I told him that this was equivalent to _an
apparition_; for here was an _ocular demonstration_ of the existence
and operation of an intelligent invisible being, &c."
[4] In his "Exposition of the Church Catechism."
[5] Remarks upon a late "Discourse of Free-Thinking," 1743, p. 47.