I HEARD very much, but beleived very little, of the Second Sight;
yet its being assumed by severall of great Veracity, I was induced
to make Inquirie after it in the Year 1652, being then confin’d to
abide in the North of Scotland by the English Usurpers. The more
generall Accounts of it were, that many Highlanders, yet far more
Islanders, were qualified with this Second Sight; that Men, Women,
and Children, indistinctly, were subject to it, and Children, where
Parents were not. Some times People came to age, who had it not when
young, nor could any tell by what Means produced. It is a Trouble to
most of them who are subject to it, and they would be rid of it any
Rate if they could. The Sight is of no long Duration, only continuing
so long as they can keep their Eyes steady without twinkling. The
hardy therefore fix their look, that they may see the longer; but
the timorous see only Glances, their Eyes always twinkles at the
first Sight of the Object. That which generally is seen by them, are
the Species of living Creatures, and of inanimate Things, which was
in Motion, such as Ships, and Habits upon Persons. They, never sie
the Species of any Person who is already dead. What they foirsie
fails not to exist in the Mode, and in that Place where it appears
to them. They cannot well know what Space of Time shall interveen
between the Apparition and the real Existance: But some of the
hardiest and longest Experience have some Rules for Conjectures; as,
if they sie a Man with a shrowding Sheet in the Apparition, they will
conjecture at the Nearness or Remoteness of his Death by the more
or less of his Bodie that is covered by it. They will ordinarily
sie their absent Friends, tho at a great Distance, some tymes no
less than from America to Scotland, sitting, standing, or walking
in some certain Place; and then they conclude with a Assurance that
they will sie them so and there. If a Man be in love with a Woman,
they will ordinarily sie the Species of that Man standing by her,
and so likewise if a Woman be in love; and they conjecture at their
Enjoyments (of each other) by the Species touching (of) the Person,
or appearing at a Distance from her (if they enjoy not one another.)
If they sie the Species of any Person who is sick to die, they sie
them covered over with the shrowding Sheet.
THESE Generalls I had verified to me by such of them as did sie,
and were esteemed honest and sober by all the Neighbourhood; for I
inquired after such for my Information. And because there were more
of these Seers in the Isles of Lewis, Harris, and Uist, than in any
other Place, I did entreat Sir James M‘Donald (who is now dead) Sir
Normand M‘Loud, and Mr. Daniel Morison, a verie honest Person, (who
are still alive,) to make Inquirie in this uncouth Sight, and to
acquaint me therewith; which they did, and all found ane Agriement in
these Generalls, and informed me of many Instances confirming what
they said. But though Men of Discretion and Honour, being but at
2d Hand, I will choose rather to put myself than my Friends on the
Hazard of being laughed at for incredible Relations.
I WAS once travelling in the Highlands, and a good Number of Servants
with me, as is usuall there; and one of them going a little before
me, entering into a House where I was to stay all Night, and going
haistily to the Door, he suddenly stept back with a Screech, and did
fall by a Stone, which hit his Foot. I asked what the Matter was, for
he seemed to be very much frighted. He told me very seriously that I
should not lodge in that House, because shortly a dead Coffin would
be carried out of it, for many were carrying of it when he was heard
cry. I neglecting his Words, and staying there, he said to other of
his Servants, he was sorry for it, and that surely what he saw would
shortly come to pass. Tho no sick Person was then there, yet the
Landlord, a healthy Highlander, died of ane appoplectick Fit before I
left the House.
In the year 1653, Alexander Monro (afterward Lieut. Coll. to the
Earl of Dunbarton’s Regiment,) and I were walking in a Place called
Ullabill, in Lochbroom, on a little Plain, at the Foot of a rugged
Hill. There was a Servant working with a Spade in the Walk before
us; his Back was to us, and his Face to the Hill. Before we came
to him, he let the Spade fall, and looked toward the Hill. He took
Notice of us as wee passed neer by him, which made me look at him;
and perceiving him to stair a little strangely, I conjectured him to
be a Seer. I called at him, at which he started and smiled. What are
you doing? said I. He answered, I have seen a very strange Thing; ane
Army of Englishmen, leeding of Horses, coming doun that Hill; and a
Number of them are come down to the Plain, and eating the Barley,
which is growing in the Field neer to the Hill. This was on the 4th
May, (for I notted the Day,) and it was four or fyve Days before the
Barley was sown in the Field he spoke of. Alexander Monro asked him
how he knew they were Englishmen? He said, because they were leeding
of Horses, and had on Hats and Bootts, which he knew no Scot Man
would have there. We took little Notice of the whole Storie, as other
than a foolish Vision; but wished that ane English Partie were there,
we being then at Warr with them, and the Place almost unaccessable
for Horsemen. But in the Beginning of August therafter, the Earle of
Midleton (then Lieut. for the King in the Highlands) having occasion
to march a Party of his toward the South Highlands, he sent his Foot
thorow a Place called Inverlawell; and the Fore-partie which was
first down the Hill, did fall off eating the Barley which was on the
litle Plain under it. And Monro calling to mynd what the Seer told
us, in May preceiding, he wrote of it, and sent ane Express to me to
Lochslin, in Ross, (where I then was) with it.
I HAD Occasion once to be in Companie where a Young Lady was, (excuse
my not naming of Persons,) and I was told there was a notable Seer
in the Companie. I called him to speak with me, as I did ordinarly
when I found any of them; and after he had answered me to several
Questions, I asked if he knew any Person to be in love with that
Lady. He said he did, but he knew not the Person; for during the two
Dayes he had been in her Company, he perceaved one standing neer her,
and his Head leaning on her Shoulder; which he said did fore-tell
that the Man should marrie her, and die before her, according to his
Observation. This was in the Year 1655. I desired him to describe the
Person, which he did; so that I could conjecture, by the Description,
of such a one, who was of that Ladyes Acquaintance, tho there were
no thought of their Marriage till two Years thereafter. And having
Occasion, in the Year 1657, to find this Seer, who was ane Islander,
in Company with the other Person whom I conjectured to have been
described by him, I called him aside, and asked if that was the
Person he saw beside the Lady near two Years then past. He said it
was he indeed, for he had seen that Lady just then standing by him
Hand in Hand. This was some few Months before their Marriage, and
that Man is since dead, and the Lady still alive.
I SHALL trouble you but with one more, which I thought most
remarkable of any that occurred to me. In January 1652, the above
mentioned Lieut. Coll. Alex. Monro and I happened to be in the House
of one Wm. M‘Cleud of Ferrinlea, in the County of Ross. He, the
Landlord, and I were sitting in three Chairs neir the Fire, and in
the Corner of the great Chimney there were two Islanders, who were
that verie Night come to the Hous, and were related to the Landlord.
While the one of them was talking with Monro, I perceaved the other
to look oddly toward me. From this Look, and his being ane Islander,
I conjectured him a Seer, and asked him, at what he stair’d? He
answered, by desiring me to rise from that Chair, for it was ane
unluckie one. I asked him why. He answered, because there was a dead
Man in the Chair nixt to me. Well, said I, if it be in the nixt
Chair, I may keep mine own. But what is the Likness of the Man? He
said he was a tall Man, with a long Grey Coat, booted, and one of
his Legs hanging over the Arme of the Chair, and his head hanging
dead to the other Side, and his Arme backward, as if it were brocken.
There were some English Troops then quartered near that Place, and
there being at that Time a great Frost after a Thaw, the Country was
covered all over with Yce. Four or Fyve of the English ryding by
this House some two Hours after the Vision, while we were sitting by
the Fire, we heard a great Noise, which prov’d to be those Troopers,
with the Help of other Servants, carrying in one of their Number, who
had got a very mischeivous Fall, and had his Arme broke; and falling
frequently in swooning Fits, they brought him into the Hall, and set
him in the verie Chair, and in the verie Posture that the Seer had
prophesied. But the Man did not die, though he recovered with great
Difficulty.
AMONG the Accounts given me by Sir Normand M‘clud, there was one
worth of special Notice, which was thus. There [was] a Gentleman in
the Isle of Harris, who was always seen by the Seers with ane Arrow
in his Thigh. Such in the Isle who thought those prognostications
infalliable, did not doubt but he would be shot in the Thigh before
he died. Sir Normand told me that he heard it the Subject of their
Discourse for many Years. At last he died without any such Accident.
Sir Normand was at his Buriall, at St Clement’s Church in the Harris.
At the same Time, the Corps of another Gentleman was brought to be
buried in the same verie Church. The Friends on either Side came to
debate who should first enter the Church, and in a Trice from Words
they came to Blows. One of the Number (who was arm’d with Bow and
Arrows) let one fly among them. (Now everie Familie in that Isle have
their Buriall-place in the Church in Stone Chests, and the Bodies
are carried in open Biers to the Buriall-place.) Sir Normand having
appeased the Tumult, one of the Arrows was found shot in the dead
Man’s Thigh. To this Sir Normand was a Witness.
IN the Account which Mr Daniel Morison, Parson in the Lewis, gave
me, there was one, tho it be hetergeneous from the subject, yet it
may [be] worth your Notice. It was of a young Woman in his Parish,
who was mightily frightned by seeing her own Image still before her,
alwayes when she came to the open Air; the Back of the Image being
alwayes to her, so that it was not a reflection as in a Mirrour, but
the Species of such a Body as her own, and in a very like Habit,
which appeared to herself continually before her. The Parson keept
her a long whyle with him, but had no Remedy of her Evill, which
troubled her exceidingly. I was told afterwards, that when she was
four or fyve Years elder she saw it not.
THESE are Matters of Fact, which I assure yow they are truely
related. But these, and all others that occurred to me, by
Information or otherwise, could never lead me into a remote
Conjecture of the Cause of so extraordinary a Phænomenon. Whither it
be a Quality in the Eyes of some People into these Pairts, concurring
with a Quality in the Air also; whither such Species be every where,
tho not seen by the Want of Eyes so qualified, or from whatever other
Cause, I must leave to the Inquiry of clearer Judgements than mine.
But a Hint may be taken from this image which appeared still to this
Woman abovementioned, and from another mentioned by Aristotle, in
the 4th of his Metaphysicks (if I remember right, for it is long
since I read it;) as also from the common Opinion that young Infants
(unsullied with many Objects) do sie Appearitions, which were not
seen by those of elder Years; as like wise from this, that severalls
did sie the Second Sight when in the Highlands or Isles, yet when
transported to live in other Countreys, especially in America, they
quite lose this Qualitie, as was told me by a Gentleman who knew some
of them in Barbadoes, who did see no Vision there, altho he knew them
to be Seers when they lived in the Isles of Scotland.
Thus far my Lord Tarbett.
* * * * *
MY LORD, after narrow Inquisition, hath delivered many true and
remarkable observes on this Subject; yet to encourage a further
Scrutiny, I crave leave to say,
THAT 1. But a few Women are endued with this Sight in respect of Men,
and their Predictions not so certane.
2. This Sight is not criminal, since a Man can come by it unawares,
and without his Consent; but it is certaine he sie more fatall and
fearfull Things than he do gladsome.
3. THE Seers avouch, that severalls who go to the _Siths_, (or
People at Rest, and, in respect of us, in Peace,) before the natural
Period of their Lyfe expyre, do frequently appear to them.
4. A VEHEMENT Desyre to attain this Airt is very helpfull to the
Inquyrer; and the Species of ane Absent Friend, which appears to the
Seers, as clearly as if he had sent his lively Picture to present it
selfe before him, is no phantastick Shaddow of a sick Apprehension,
but a reality, and a Messinger, coming for unknown Reasons, not from
the originall Similitude of it selfe, but from a more swift and
pragmantick People, which recreat them selves in offering secret
Intelligence to Men, tho generally they are unacquainted with that
Kind of Correspondence, as if they had lived in a different element
from them.
5. THO my Collections were written long before I saw My Lord of
Tarbett’s, yet I am glad that his descriptions and mine correspond
so nearly. The Maid my Lord mentions, who saw her Image still before
her, suteth with the CO-WALKER named in my Account; which tho some,
at first Thought, might conjecture to be by the Refraction of a Cloud
or Mist, as in the Parelij, (the whole Air and every Drop of Water
being a Mirrour to returne the Species of Things, were our visive
Faculty sharpe enough to apprehend them,) or a naturall Reflexion,
from the same Reasons that an Echo can be redoubled by Airt; yet it
were more fasable to impute this Second Sight to a Quality infused
into the Eye by ane Unction: for Witchies have a sleepie Oyntment,
that, when applyed, troubles their Fantasies, advancing it to have
unusuall Figures and Shapes represented to it, as if it were a Fit
of Fanaticism, Hypocondriack Melancholly, or Possession of some
insinuating Spirit, raising the Soul beyond its common Strain, if the
palpable Instances and Realities seen, and innocently objected to the
Senses did not disprove it, make the Matter a palpable Verity, and no
Deception; yet since this Sight can be bestowed without Oyntment, or
dangerous Compact, the Qualification is not of so bad an Originall.
Therefore,
6. BY my Lord’s good Leave, I presume to say, that this Sight can
be no Quality of the Air nor of the Eyes; becaus, 1. such as live in
the same Air, and sie all other Things as farr off and as clearly,
yet have not the SECOND SIGHT. 2. A SEER can give another Person
this Sight transiently, by putting his Hand and Foot in the Posture
he requires of him. 3. The unsullied Eyes of Infants can naturally
perceave no new unaccustomed Objects, but what appear to other Men,
unless exalted and clarified some Way, as Ballaam’s Ass for a Time;
tho in a Witches Eye the Beholder cannot sie his own Image reflected,
as in the Eyes of other People; so that Defect of Objects, as well
as Diversities of the Subject, may appear differently on severall
Tempers and Ages. 4. Tho also some are of so venemous a Constitution,
by being radicated in Envy and Malice, that they pierce and kill
(like a Cockatrice) whatever Creature they first set their Eye on
in the Morning; so was it with Walter Grahame, some Time living in
the Paroch wherein now I am, who killed his own Cow after commending
its Fatness, and shot a Hair with his Eyes, having praised its
swiftness, (such was the Infection of ane evill Eye;) albeit this was
unusuall, yet he saw no Object but what was obvious to other Men as
well as to himselfe. 5. If the being transported to live in another
Countrey did obscure the Second Sight, nather the Parson nor the Maid
needed be much troubled for her Reflex-selfe; a little Peregrination,
and going from her wonted Home, would have salved her Fear. Wherefore,
7. SINCE the Things seen by the Seers are real Entities, the Presages
and Predictions found true, but a few endued with this Sight, and
those not of bad Lyves, or addicted to Malifices, the true Solution
of the Phænomenon seems rather to be, the courteous Endeavours of
our fellow Creatures in the Invisible World to convince us, (in
Opposition to Sadduce’s, Socinians, and Atheists,) of a Deity; of
Spirits; of a possible and harmless Method of Correspondence betwixt
Men and them, even in this Lyfe; of their Operation for our Caution
and Warning; of the Orders and Degrees of Angells, whereof one
Order, with Bodies of Air condensed and curiously shap’t, may be
nixt to Man, superior to him in Understanding, yet unconfirmed; and
of their Region, Habitation, and Influences on Man, greater than
that of Starrs on inanimat Bodies; a Knowledge (be-like) reserved
for these last atheistick Ages, wherein the Profanity of Mens Lives
hath debauched and blinded their Understanding, as to MOSES, JESUS,
and the Prophets, (unless they get Convictions from Things formerly
known,) as from the Regions of the Dead: nor doth the ceasing of
the Visions, upon the Seers Transmigration into forrein Kingdoms,
make his Lordship’s Conjecture of the Quality of the Air and Eye a
white the more probable; but, on the Contrary, it confirms greatly
my Account of ane Invisible People, guardian over and care-full of
Men, who have their different Offices and Abilities in distinct
Counterey’s, as appears in Dan. 10. 13. viz. about Israels, Grecia’s,
and Persia’s assistant Princes, whereof who so prevaileth giveth
Dominion and Ascendant to his Pupills and Vassalls over the opposite
Armies and Countreys; so that every Countrey and Kingdom having
their topical Spirits, or Powers assisting and governing them,
the SCOTTISH SEER banished to America, being a Stranger there, as
well to the invisible as to the visible Inhabitants, and wanting
a Fimiliarity of his former Correspondents, he could not have the
Favour and Warnings, by the severall Visions and Predictions which
were wont to be granted him by these Acquantances and Fayourites in
his own Countrey. For if what he wont to sie were Realities, (as I
have made appear,) ’twere too great ane Honour for Scotland to have
such seldom-seen Watchers and predominant Powers over it alone,
acting in it so expressly, and all other Nations wholly destitute of
the lyke; tho, without all peradventure, all other People wanted the
right Key of their Cabinet, and the exact Method of Correspondence
with them, except the sagacious active Scots, as many of them have
retained it of a long Time, and by Surpryses and Raptures do often
foirtell what in Kyndness is really represented to them at severall
Occasions. To which Purpose the learned lynx-ey’d Mr. Baxter, on Rev.
12. 7. writting of the Fight betwixt Michaell and the Dragon, gives a
verie pertinent Note, viz. That he knows not but ere any great Action
(especiall tragicall) is don on Earth, that first the Battell and
Victory is acted and atchieved in the Air betwixt the good and evill
Spirits: Thus he. It seems these were the mens Guardians; and the
lyke Battells are oft tymes perceav’d in a Loaft in the Nycht-time;
the Event of which myght easily be represented by some one of the
Number to a Correspondent on Earth, as frequently the Report of
great Actions have been more swiftly caried to other Countreys than
all the Airt of us Mortals could possibly dispatch it. St. Austine,
on Mark, 9. 4. giveth no small Intimation of this Truth, averring
that Elias appeared with Jesus on the Mount in his proper Bodie, but
Moses in ane aereall Bodie, assumed like the Angels who appeared, and
had Ability to eat with Abraham, tho no Necessity on the Account of
their Bodies. As lyke wise the late Doctrine of the Pre-existence
of Souls, living into aereall Vehicles, gives a singular Hint of
the Possibility of the Thing, if not a direct Prooff of the whole
Assertion; which yet moreover may be illuminated by diverse other
Instances of the lyke Nature, and as wonderfull, besides what is
above said. As,
8. THE invisible Wights which haunt Houses seem rather to be some
of our subterranean Inhabitants, (which appear often to Men of the
Second Sight,) than evill Spirits or Devills; because, tho they
throw great Stones, Pieces of Earth and Wood, at the Inhabitants,
they hurt them not at all, as if they acted not malitiously, like
Devills at all, but in Sport, lyke Buffoons and Drolls. All Ages have
affoorded some obscure Testimonies of it, as Pythagoras his Doctrine
of Transmigration; Socrates’s Dæmon that gave him [Warning] of future
Dangers; Platoe’s classing them into various vehiculated Specieses
of Spirits; Dionisius Areopagita’s marshalling nyne Orders of
Spirits, superiour and subordinate; the Poets their borrowing of the
Philosophers, and adding their own Fancies of Fountain, River, and
Sea Nymphs, Wood, Hill, and Montain Inhabitants, and that every Place
and Thing, in Cities and Countreys, had speciall invisible regular
Gods and Governours. Cardan speaks of his Father his seeing the
Species of his Friend, in a moon-shyn Night, riding fiercely by his
Window on a white Horse, the verie Night his Friend dy’d at a Vast
Distance from him; by which he understood that some Alteration would
suddenly ensue. Cornelius Aggrippa, and the learned Dr. Mor, have
severall Passages tending that Way. The Noctambulo’s themselves would
appear to have some forrein joquing Spirit possessing and supporting
them, when they walk on deep Waters and Topes of Houses without
Danger, when asleep and in the dark; for it was no way probable that
their Apprehension, and strong Imagination setting the Animal Spirits
a work to move the Body, could preserve it from sinking in the
Deepth, or falling down head-long, when asleep, any more than when
awake, the Body being then as ponderous as before; and it is hard
to attribute it to a Spirit flatelie evill and Enemy to Man, because
the Noctambulo returns to his own Place safe. And the most furious
Tribe of the Dæmons are not permitted by Providence to attacke Men so
frequently either by Night or by Day: For in our Highlands, as there
may be many fair Ladies of this aereal Order, which do often tryst
with lascivious young Men, in the quality of Succubi, or lightsome
Paramours and Strumpets, called _Leannain Sith_, or familiar
Spirits (in Dewter. 18. 11.); so do many of our Hyghlanders, as if
a strangling by the Night MARE, pressed with a fearfull Dream, or
rather possessed by one of our aereall Neighbours, rise up fierce in
the Night, and apprehending the neerest Weapons, do push and thrust
at all Persons in the same Room with them, sometymes wounding their
own Comerades to dead. The lyke whereof fell sadly out within a few
Miles of me at the writting hereof. I add but one Instance more, of
a very young Maid, who lived neir to my last Residence, that in one
Night learned a large Peice of Poesy, by the frequent Repetition
of it, from one of our nimble and courteous Spirits, whereof a Part
was pious, the rest superstitious, (for I have a Copy of it,) and no
other Person was ever heard to repeat it before, nor was the Maid
capable to compose it of herself.
9. He demonstrated and made evident to Sense this extraordinary
Vision of our Tramontain Seers, and what is seen by them, by what is
said above, many haveing seen this same Spectres and Apparitions at
once, haveing their visive Faculties entire; for _non est disputandum
de gustu_. Itt now remaines to shew that it is not unsutable to
Reason nor the Holy Scriptures.
FIRST, That it is not repugnant to Reason, doeth appear from this,
that it is no less strange for Immortal Sparks and Souls to come
and be immersed into gross terrestrial elementary Bodies, and be
so propagated, so nourished, so fed, soe cloathed as they are,
and breathe in such ane Air and World prepared for them, then for
Hollanders or Hollow-cavern Inhabitants to live and traffick among
us, in another State of Being, without our Knowledge. For Raymond de
Subinde, in his 3d Booke, Chap. 12. argues quaintly, that all Sorts
of Living Creatures have a happie rational Politie of there own, with
great Contentment; which Government and mutual Converse of theirs
they all pride and pluim themselves, because it is as unknown to Man,
as Man is to them. Much more, that the Sone of the HIGHEST SPIRIT
should assume a Bodie like ours, convinces all the World that no
other Thing that is possible needs be much wondered at.
2. The Manucodiata, or Bird of Paradise, living in the highest
Region of the Air; common Birds in the second Region; Flies and
Insects in the lowest; Men and Beasts on the Earth’s Surface;
Worms, Otters, Badgers, in Waters; lyke wise Hell is inhabited at
the Centre, and Heaven in the Circumference: can we then think
the middle Cavities of the Earth emptie? I have seen in Weems, (a
Place in the Countie of Fyfe, in Scotland,) divers Caves cut out
as vast Temples under Ground; the lyke is a Countie of England;
in Malta is a Cave, wherein Stons of a curious Cut are thrown in
great Numbers every Day; so I have had barbed Arrow-heads of yellow
Flint, that could not be cut so small and neat, of so brittle a
Substance, by all the Airt of Man. It would seem therefoir that
these mention’d Works were done by certaine Spirits of pure Organs,
and not by Devills, whose continual Torments could not allow them
so much Leasure. Besides these, I have found fyve Curiosities in
Scotland, not much observ’d to be elsewhere. 1. The Brounies, who
in some Families are Drudges, clean the Houses and Dishes after all
go to Bed, taking with him his Portion of Food and removing befor
Day-break. 2. The Mason Word, which tho some make a Misterie of it,
I will not conceal a little of what I know. It is lyke a Rabbinical
Tradition, in way of Comment on Jachin and Boaz, the two Pillars
erected in Solomon’s Temple, (1 Kings, 7. 21.) with ane Addition
of some secret Signe delyvered from Hand to Hand, by which they
know and become familiar one with another. 3. This Second Sight,
so largely treated of before. 4. Charmes, and curing by them very
many Diseases, sometimes by transferring the Sicknes to another.
5. A being Proof of Lead, Iron, and Silver, or a Brieve making Men
invulnerable. Divers of our Scottish Commanders and Souldiers have
been seen with blue Markes only, after they were shot with leaden
Balls; which seems to be an Italian Trick, for they seem to be a
People too currious and magically inclyned, Finally Iris-men, our
Northern-Scotish, and our Athole Men are so much addicted to and
delighted with Harps and Musick, as if, like King Saul, they were
possessed with a forrein Spirit, only with this Difference, that
Musick did put Saul’s Pley-fellow a sleep, but roused and awaked
our Men, vanquishing their own Spirits at Pleasure, as if they were
impotent of its Powers, and unable to command it; for wee have seen
some poor Beggers of them, chattering their Teeth for Cold, that how
soon they saw the Fire, and heard the Harp, leapt thorow the House
like Goats and Satyrs. As there paralell Stories in all Countries and
Ages reported of these our obscure People, (which are no Dotages,)
so is it no more of Necessitie to us fully to know their Beings and
Manner of Life, then to understand distinctly the Politie of the nyne
Orders of Angels; or with what Oyl the Lamp of the Sun is maintained
so long and regularlie; or why the Moon is called a great Luminary
in Scripture, while it only appears to be so; or if the Moon be
truly inhabited, because Telescopes discover Seas and Mountains in
it, as well as flaming Furnishes in the Sun; or why the Discovery of
America was look’t on as a Fairie Tale, and the Reporters hooted at
as Inventors of ridiculous Utopias, or the first probable Asserters
punished as Inventures of new Gods and Worlds; or why in England the
King cures the Struma by stroaking, and the Seventh Son in Scotland;
whither his temperat Complexion conveys a Balsome, and sucks out
the corrupting Principles by a frequent warme sanative Contact, or
whither the Parents of the Seventh Child put furth a more eminent
Virtue to his Production than to all the Rest, as being the certain
Meridian and hight to which their Vigour ascends, and from that furth
have a graduall declyning into a feebleness of the Bodie and its
Production. And then, 1. Why is not the 7th Son infected himselfe
by that Contagion he extracts from another? 2. How can continual
stroaking with a cold Hand have foe strong a natural Operation, as
to exhale all the Infections warming corroding Vapours. 3. Why may
not a 7th Daughter have the same Vertue? So that it appears, albeit,
a happie natural Constitution concurre, yet something in it above
Nature. Therefore every Age hath left some secret for its Discoverie;
who knows but this Entercourse betwixt the two Kinds of rationall
Inhabitants of the same Earth may be not only beleived shortly,
but as friely entertain’d, and as well known, as now the Airt of
Navigation, Printing, Limning, riding on Saddles with Stirrups,
and the Discoveries of Microscopes, which were sometimes a great a
Wonder, and as hard to be beleived.
10. THO I will not be so curious nor so peremptorie as he who will
prove the Posibility of the Philosopher’s Stone from Scripture,
Job, 28. 1. 2. Job, 22. 24. 25.; or the Pluralitie of Worlds, from
John, 14. 2. and Hebrews ij. 3.; nor the Circulation of Blood from
Eccles. 12. and 6.; nor the Tanismanical Airt, from the Blind and
Lame mentioned in 2d of Samuel, 5. 6. yet I humblie propose these
Passages which may give some Light to our Subject at least, and show
that this Polity and Rank of People is not a Thing impossible, nor
the modest and innocent Scrutiny of them impertinent or unsafe. The
Legion or Brigad of Spirits (mentioned Mark, 5. 10.) besought our
Saviour not to send them away out of the Countrey; which shows they
were DÆMONES LOCI, Topical Spirits, and peculiar Superintendents and
Supervisors assign’d to that Province. And the Power over the Nations
granted (Rev. 2. 26.) to the Conquerors of Vice and Infidelitie,
Sound somewhat to that Purpose. Tobit had a Dæmon attending Marriage,
Chap. 6. Verse, 15; and in Matth. 4. and 5. ane evill Spirit came in
a Visible Shape to tempt our Saviour, who himselfe denyed not the
sensible appearing of Ghosts to our Sight, but said, their Bodies
were not composed of Flesh and Bones, as ours, Luke, 24. 39. And in
Philip. 2. 10. our verie Subterraneans are expressly said to bow to
the Name of JESUS. Elisha, not intellectually only, but sensibly, saw
Gehazi when out of the Reach of ane ordinary View. It wants not good
Evidents that there are more managed by God’s Spirits, good, evill,
and intermediate Spirits, among Men in this World, then we are aware
of; the good Spirits ingesting fair and heroick Apprehensions and
Images of Vertue and the divyne Life, thereby animating us to act for
a higher Happines, according to our Improvement; and relinquishing
us as strangely upon our Neglect, or our embraceing the deceatfull
syrene-like Pictures and Representations of Pleasures and Gain,
presented to our Imaginations by evill and sportfull Angells, to
allure to ane unthinking, ungenerous, and sensual Lyfe; non of them
having power to compell us to any Misdemeanour without our flat
Consent. Moreover, this Life of ours being called a Warfair, and
God’s saying that at last there will be no Peace to the Wicked, our
bussie and silent Companions also being called _Siths_, or _People
at Rest and Quiet_, in respect of us; and withall many Ghosts
appearing to Men that want this _Second Sight_, in the very Shapes,
and speaking the same Language, they did when incorporate and alive
with us; a Matter that is of ane old imprescriptible Tradition, (_our
Highlanders_ making still a Distinction betwixt _Sluagh Saoghalta_
and _Sluagh Sith_, averring that the Souls goe to the _Sith_ when
dislodged;) many real Treasures and Murders being discovered by Souls
that pass from among our selves, or by the Kindness of these our
airie Neighbours, non of which Spirits can be altogither inorganical.
No less than the Conseits about Purgatory, or a State of Rescue; the
_Limbus Patrum et Infantum_, Inventions, [which] tho misapplyed, yet
are not Chimæras, and altogither groundless. For _ab origine_, it is
nothing but blansh and faint Discoveries of this SECRET REPUBLICK
of ours here treated on, and additional Fictions of Monks doting
and crazied Heads, our Creed saying that our Saviour descended εἰς
ᾅδου, to the invisible Place and People. And many Divines supposing
that the Deity appear’d in a visible Shape seen by Adam in the Cooll
of the Day, and speaking to him with ane audible voice. And Jesus,
probably by the Ministery of invisible Attendants, conveying more
meat of the same Kind to the fyve Thowsand that wes fed by him with
a very few Loaves and Fishes, (for a new Creation it was not.) The
Zijmjiim and Ochim, in Isa. 13. 21. 22. Thes Satyres, and doolfull
unknown Creatures of Islands and Deserts, seem to have a plain
Prospect that Way. Finally, the eternal Happiness enjoyed in the 3d
Heavens, being more mysterious than most of Men take it to be. It is
not a sense whollie adduced to Scripture to say, that this SIGHT, and
the due Objects of it, hath some Vestige in holy Write, but rather
’tis modestly deduced from it.
11. It only now remains to ansear the obvious Objections against the
Reality and Lawfullness of this Speculation.
QUESTION 1. How do you salve the Second Sight from Compact and
Witchcraft?
ANSWER. Tho this Correspondence with the Intermediate Unconfirm’d
People (betwixt Man and Angell) be not ordinary to all of us who are
Superterraneans, yet this SIGHT falling some Persons by Accident, and
its being connatural to others from their Birth, the Derivation of it
cannot always be wicked. A too great Curiositie, indeed, to acquyre
any unnecessary Airt, may be blameworthy; but diverse of the SECRET
COMMONWEALTH may, by Permission, discover themselves as innocently to
us, who are in another State, as some of us Men do to Fishes, which
are in another Element, when we plunge and dive into the Bottom of
the Seas, their native Region; and in Process of Time we may come to
converse as familiarly with these nimble and agile Clans (but with
greater Pleasure and Profit,) as we do now with the Chino’s Antipodes.
QUESTION 2. Are they subject to Vice, Lusts? Passion, and Injustice,
as we who live on the Surface of the Earth?
ANSWER. The Seers tell us that these wandering Aereal People have
not such an Impetus and fatall Tendency to any Vice as Men, as not
being drenched into so gross and dregy Bodies as we, but yet are
in ane imperfect State, and some of them making better Essays for
heroick Actions than others; having the same Measures of Vertue
and Vice as wee, and still expecting advancement to a higher and
more splendid State of Lyfe. One of them is stronger than many
Men, yet do not incline to hurt Mankind, except by Commission for
a gross Misdemeanour, as the destroying Angell of Ægypt, and the
Assyrians, Exod. 12. 29. 2 Kings, 10. 35. They haunt most where is
most Barbaritie; and therefoir our ignorant Ancestors, to prevent the
Insults of that strange People, used as rude and course a Remedie;
such as Exorcisms, Donations, and Vows: But how soon ever the true
Piety prevailed in any Place, it did not put the Inhabitants beyond
the Reach and Awthoritie of these subtile inferiour Co-inhabitants
and Colleagues of ours: The FATHER OF ALL SPIRITS, and the Person
himselfe, having the only Command of his Soul and Actions, a
concurrance they may have to what is virtuously done; for upon
committing of a foul Deed, one will find a Demure upon his Soul, as
if his cheerfull Collegue had deserted him.
QUESTION 3. Do these airie Tribes procreate? If so, how are they
nourished, and at what period of Time do they die?
ANSWER. Supposing all Spirits to be created at once in the Beginning,
Souls to pre-exist and to circle about into several States of
Probationship; to make them either totally unexcusable, or perfectly
happie against the last Day, solves all the Difficulties. But in
very Deed, and speaking suteable to the Nature of Things, there is
no more Absurditie for a Spirit to inform ane Infant in Bodie of
Airs, than a Bodie composed of dull and drusie Earth; the best of
Spirits have alwayes delyghted more to appear into aereal, than
into terrestrial Bodyes. They feed most what on Quintessences, and
aetheriall Essences. The Pith and Spirits only of Women’s Milk feed
their Children, being artificially conveyed, (as Air and Oyl sink
into our Bodies,) to make them vigorous and fresh. And this shorter
Way of conveying a pure Aliment, (without the usuall Digestions,)
by transfusing it, and transpyring thorow the Pores into the Veins,
Arteries, and Vessells that supplie the Bodie, is nothing more
absurd, than ane Infant’s being fed by the Navel before it is borne,
or than a Plant, which groweth by attracting a livelie Juice from the
Earth thorow many small Roots and Tendons, whose courser Pairts be
adapted and made connatural to the Whole, doth quickly coalesce by
the ambient Cold; and so are condens’d and bak’d up into a confirm’d
Wood in the one, and solid Bodie of the Flesh and Bone in the other.
A Notion which, if intertained and approv’d, may shew that the late
Invention of soaking and transfusing (not Blood, but) athereal
virtuall Spirits, may be usefull both for Nourishment and Health,
whereof is a Vestige in the damnable Practise of evill Angells, their
sucking of Blood and Spirits out of Witches Bodys (till they drew
them into a deform’d and dry Leanness,) to feid their own Vehicles
withall, leaving what we call the Witches Mark behind; a Spot that I
have seen, as a small Mole, horny, and brown-coloured; throw which
Mark, when a large Brass Pin was thrust (both in Buttock, Nose, and
Rooff of the Mouth,) till it bowed and become crooked, the Witches,
both Men and Women, nather felt a Pain, nor did bleed, nor knew the
precise Time when this was adoing to them, (there Eyes only being
covered.) Now the Air being a Body as well as Earth, no Reason can be
given why there may not be Particles of more vivific Spirit form’d
of it for Procreation, then is possible to be of Earth, which takes
more Time and Pains to rarify and ripen it, ere it can come to have
a prolific Virtue. And if our Aping Darlings did not thus procreate,
there whole Number would be exhausted after a considerable Space of
Time. For tho they are of more refyned Bodies and Intellectualls than
wee, and of far less heavy and corruptive Humours, (which cause a
Dissolution,) yet many of their Lives being dissonant to right Reason
and their own Laws, and their Vehicles not being wholly frie of Lust
and Passion, especially of the more spirituall and hautie Sins they
pass (after a long healthy Lyfe) into one Orb and Receptacle fitted
for their Degree, till they come under the general Cognizance of the
last Day.
QUESTION 4. Doth the acquiring of this Second Sight make any Change
on the Acquirers Body, Mind, or Actions?
ANSWER. All uncouth SIGHTS enfeebles the SEER. Daniel, tho familiar
with divyne Visions, yet fell frequently doun without Strength,
when dazzled with a Power which had the Ascendant of, and passed
on him beyond his Comprehension, Chap. 10. 8. 17. So our SEER is
put in a Rapture, Transport, and sort of Death, as divested of his
Body and all its Senses, when he is first made participant of this
curious Peice of Knowledge: But it maketh no Wramp or Strain in the
Understanding of any; only to the Fancy’s of clownish or illiterate
Men, it creates some Affrightments and Disturbances, because of the
Strongness of the Showes, and their Unacquaintedness with them. And
as for their Lyfe, the Persons endued with this Rarity are, for
the most Part, candid, honest, and sociable People. If any of them
be subject to Immoralities, this obstruse Skill is not to be blamed
for it; for unless themselves be the Tempters, the Colonies of the
Invisible Plantations, with which they intercommune, do provoke them
by no Villainy or Malifice, nather at their first Acquaintance nor
after a long Familiarity.
QUESTION 5. Doth not Sathan interpose in such Cases by many subtile
unthought Insinuations, as to him who let the Fly, or Familiar, go
out of the Box, and yet found the Fly of his own putting in, as
serviceable as the other would have been?
ANSWER. The Goodness of the Lyfe, and Designs of the ancient Prophets
and Seers, was one of the best Prooffs of their Mission.[37]