Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions - Chapters 5-6



      Chapter 5 - Modern Prophecies

AN EPIDEMIC TERROR of the end of the world has several times
spread over the nations. The most remarkable was that which seized
Christendom about the middle of the tenth century. Numbers of
fanatics appeared in France, Germany, and Italy at that time,
preaching that the thousand years prophesied in the Apocalypse as
the term of the world's duration were about to expire, and that
the Son of Man would appear in the clouds to judge the godly and
the ungodly. The delusion appears to have been discouraged by the
church, but it nevertheless spread rapidly among the people.41*

The scene of the last judgment was expected to be at Jerusalem. In
the year 999, the number of pilgrims proceeding eastward, to await
the coming of the Lord in that city, was so great that they were
compared to a desolating army. Most of them sold their goods and
possessions before they quitted Europe, and lived upon the
proceeds in the Holy Land. Buildings of every sort were suffered
to fall into ruins. It was thought useless to repair them, when
the end of the world was so near. Many noble edifices were
deliberately pulled down. Even churches, usually so well
maintained, shared the general neglect. Knights, citizens, and
serfs, travelled eastwards in company, taking with them their
wives and children, singing psalms as they went, and looking with
fearful eyes upon the sky, which they expected each minute to
open, to let the Son of God descend in his glory.

During the thousandth year the number of pilgrims increased. Most
of them were smitten with terror as with a plague. Every
phenomenon of nature filled them with alarm. A thunder-storm sent
them all upon their knees in mid-march. It was the opinion that
thunder was the voice of God, announcing the day of judgment.
Numbers expected the earth to open, and give up its dead at the
sound. Every meteor in the sky seen at Jerusalem brought the whole
Christian population into the streets to weep and pray. The
pilgrims on the road were in the same alarm:

"Lorsque, pendant la nuit, un globe de lumière
S'échappa quelquefois de la voûte des cieux,
Et traça dans sa chûte un long sillon de feux,
La troupe suspendit sa marche solitaire."42*

Fanatic preachers kept up the flame of terror. Every shooting star
furnished occasion for a sermon, in which the sublimity of the
approaching judgment was the principal topic.

The appearance of comets has been often thought to foretell the
speedy dissolution of this world. Part of this belief still
exists; but the comet is no longer looked upon as the sign, but
the agent of destruction. So lately as in the year 1832 the
greatest alarm spread over the continent of Europe, especially in
Germany, lest the comet, whose appearance was then foretold by
astronomers, should destroy the earth. The danger of our globe was
gravely discussed. Many persons refrained from undertaking or
concluding any business during that year, in consequence solely of
their apprehension that this terrible comet would dash us and our
world to atoms.

During seasons of great pestilence men have often believed the
prophecies of crazed fanatics, that the end of the world was come.
Credulity is always greatest in times of calamity. During the
great plague, which ravaged all Europe between the years 1345 and
1350, it was generally considered that the end of the world was at
hand. Pretended prophets were to be found in all the principal
cities of Germany, France, and Italy, predicting that within ten
years the trump of the Archangel would sound, and the Saviour
appear in the clouds to call the earth to judgment.

No little consternation was created in London in 1736 by the
prophecy of the famous Whiston, that the world would be destroyed
in that year, on the 13th of October. Crowds of people went out on
the appointed day to Islington, Hampstead, and the fields
intervening, to see the destruction of London, which was to be the
"beginning of the end." A satirical account of this folly is given
in Swift's Miscellanies, vol. iii., entitled, A true and faithful
Narrative of what passed in London on a Rumour of the Day of
Judgment. An authentic narrative of this delusion would be
interesting; but this solemn witticism of Pope and Gay is not to
be depended upon.

In the year 1761 the citizens of London alarmed by two shocks of
an earthquake, and the prophecy of a third, which was to destroy
them altogether. The first shock was felt on the 8th of February,
and threw down several chimneys in the neighbourhood of Limehouse
and Poplar; the second happened on the 8th of March, and was
chiefly felt in the north of London, and towards Hampstead and
Highgate. It soon became the subject of general remark, that there
was exactly an interval of a month between the shocks; and a
crack-brained fellow, named Bell, a soldier in the Life Guards,
was so impressed with the idea that there would be a third in
another month, that he lost his senses altogether, and ran about
the streets predicting the destruction of London on the 5th of
April. Most people thought that the first would have been a more
appropriate day; but there were not wanting thousands who
confidently believed the prediction, and took measures to
transport themselves and families from the scene of the impending
calamity. As the awful day approached, the excitement became
intense, and great numbers of credulous people resorted to all the
villages within a circuit of twenty miles, awaiting the doom of
London. Islington, Highgate, Hampstead, Harrow, and Blackheath,
were crowded with panic-stricken fugitives, who paid exorbitant
prices for accommodation to the housekeepers of these secure
retreats. Such as could not afford to pay for lodgings at any of
those places, remained in London until two or three days before
the time, and then encamped in the surrounding fields, awaiting
the tremendous shock which was to lay their high city all level
with the dust. As happened during a similar panic in the time of
Henry VIII, the fear became contagious, and hundreds who had
laughed at the prediction a week before, packed up their goods,
when they saw others doing so, and hastened away. The river was
thought to be a place of great security, and all the
merchant-vessels in the port were filled with people, who passed
the night between the 4th and 5th on board, expecting every
instant to see St. Paul's totter, and the towers of Westminster
Abby rock in the wind and fall amid a cloud of dust. The greater
part of the fugitives returned on the following day, convinced
that the prophet was a false one; but many judged it more prudent
to allow a week to elapse before they trusted their dear limbs in
London. Bell lost all credit in a short time, and was looked upon
even by the most credulous as a mere madman. He tried some other
prophecies, but nobody was deceived by them; and, in a few months
afterwards, he was confined in a lunatic asylum.

A panic terror of the end of the world seized the good people of
Leeds and its neighbourhood in the year 1806. It arose from the
following circumstances. A hen, in a village close by, laid eggs,
on which were inscribed the words "Christ is coming." Great
numbers visited the spot, and examined these wondrous eggs,
convinced that the day of judgment was near at hand. Like sailors
in a storm, expecting every instant to go to the bottom, the
believers suddenly became religious, prayed violently, and
flattered themselves that they repented them of their evil
courses. But a plain tale soon put them down, and quenched their
religion entirely. Some gentlemen, hearing of the matter, went one
fine morning, and caught the poor hen in the act of laying one of
her miraculous eggs. They soon ascertained beyond doubt that the
egg had been inscribed with some corrosive ink, and cruelly forced
up again into the bird's body. At this explanation, those who had
prayed, now laughed, and the world wagged as merrily as of yore.

At the time of the plague in Milan, in 1630, of which so affecting
a description has been left us by Ripamonte, in his interesting
work De Peste Mediolani, the people, in their distress, listened
with avidity to the predictions of astrologers and other
impostors. It is singular enough that the plague was foretold a
year before it broke out. A large comet appearing in 1628, the
opinions of astrologers were divided with regard to it. Some
insisted that it was a forerunner of a bloody war; others
maintained that it predicted a great famine; but the greater
number, founding their judgment upon its pale colour, thought it
portended a pestilence. The fulfilment of their prediction brought
them into great repute while the plague was raging.

Other prophecies were current, which were asserted to have been
delivered hundreds of years previously. They had a most pernicious
effect upon the mind of the vulgar, as they induced a belief in
fatalism. By taking away the hope of recovery—that greatest balm
in every malady—they increased threefold the ravages of the
disease. One singular prediction almost drove the unhappy people
mad. An ancient couplet, preserved for ages by tradition,
foretold, that in the year 1630 the devil would poison all Milan.
Early one morning in April, and before the pestilence had reached
its height, the passengers were surprised to see that all the
doors in the principal streets of the city were marked with a
curious daub, or spot, as if a sponge, filled with the purulent
matter of the plague-sores, had been pressed against them. The
whole population were speedily in movement to remark the strange
appearance, and the greatest alarm spread rapidly. Every means was
taken to discover the perpetrators, but in vain. At last the
ancient prophecy was remembered, and prayers were offered up in
all the churches that the machinations of the Evil One might be
defeated. Many persons were of opinion that the emissaries of
foreign powers were employed to spread infectious poison over the
city; but by far the greater number were convinced that the powers
of hell had conspired against them, and that the infection was
spread by supernatural agencies. In the mean time the plague
increased fearfully. Distrust and alarm took possession of every
mind. Everything was believed to have been poisoned by the Devil;
the waters of the wells, the standing corn in the fields, and the
fruit upon the trees. It was believed that all objects of touch
were poisoned; the walls of the houses, the pavement of the
streets, and the very handles of the doors. The populace were
raised to a pitch of ungovernable fury. A strict watch was kept
for the Devil's emissaries, and any man who wanted to be rid of an
enemy, had only to say that he had seen him besmearing a door with
ointment; his fate was certain death at the hands of the mob. An
old man, upwards of eighty years of age, a daily frequenter of the
church of St. Antonio, was seen, on rising from his knees, to wipe
with the skirt of his cloak the stool on which he was about to sit
down. A cry was raised immediately that he was besmearing the seat
with poison. A mob of women, by whom the church was crowded,
seized hold of the feeble old man, and dragged him out by the hair
of his head, with horrid oaths and imprecations. He was trailed in
this manner through the mire to the house of the municipal judge,
that he might be put to the rack, and forced to discover his
accomplices; but he expired on the way. Many other victims were
sacrificed to the popular fury. One Mora, who appears to have been
half a chemist and half a barber, was accused of being in league
with the Devil to poison Milan. His house was surrounded, and a
number of chemical preparations were found. The poor man asserted,
that they were intended as preservatives against infection; but
some physicians, to whom they were submitted, declared they were
poison. Mora was put to the rack, where he for a long time
asserted his innocence. He confessed at last, when his courage was
worn down by torture, that he was in league with the Devil and
foreign powers to poison the whole city; that he had anointed the
doors, and infected the fountains of water. He named several
persons as his accomplices, who were apprehended and put to a
similar torture. They were all found guilty, and executed. Mora's
house was rased to the ground, and a column erected on the spot,
with an inscription to commemorate his guilt.

While the public mind was filled with these marvellous
occurrences, the plague continued to increase. The crowds that
were brought together to witness the executions spread the
infection among one another. But the fury of their passions, and
the extent of their credulity, kept pace with the violence of the
plague; every wonderful and preposterous story was believed. One,
in particular, occupied them to the exclusion, for a long time, of
every other. The Devil himself had been seen. He had taken a house
in Milan, in which he prepared his poisonous unguents, and
furnished them to his emissaries for distribution. One man had
brooded over such tales till he became firmly convinced that the
wild flights of his own fancy were realities. He stationed himself
in the market-place of Milan, and related the following story to
the crowds that gathered round him. He was standing, he said, at
the door of the cathedral, late in the evening; and when there was
nobody nigh, he saw a dark-coloured chariot, drawn by six
milk-white horses, stop close beside him. The chariot was followed
by a numerous train of domestics in dark liveries, mounted on
dark-coloured steeds. In the chariot there sat a tall stranger of
a majestic aspect; his long black hair floated in the wind—fire
flashed from his large black eyes, and a curl of ineffable scorn
dwelt upon his lips. The look of the stranger was so sublime that
he was awed, and trembled with fear when he gazed upon him. His
complexion was much darker than that of any man he had ever seen,
and the atmosphere around him was hot and suffocating. He
perceived immediately that he was a being of another world. The
stranger, seeing his trepidation, asked him blandly, yet
majestically, to mount beside him. He had no power to refuse, and
before he was well aware that he had moved, he found himself in
the chariot. Onwards they went, with the rapidity of the wind, the
stranger speaking no word, until they stopped before a door in the
high-street of Milan. There was a crowd of people in the street,
but, to his great surprise, no one seemed to notice the
extraordinary equipage and its numerous train. From this he
concluded that they were invisible. The house at which they
stopped appeared to be a shop, but the interior was like a vast
half-ruined palace. He went with his mysterious guide through
several large and dimly-lighted rooms. In one of them, surrounded
by huge pillars of marble, a senate of ghosts was assembled,
debating on the progress of the plague. Other parts of the
building were enveloped in the thickest darkness, illumined at
intervals by flashes of lightning, which allowed him to
distinguish a number of gibing and chattering skeletons, running
about and pursuing each other, or playing at leap-frog over one
another's backs. At the rear of the mansion was a wild,
uncultivated plot of ground, in the midst of which arose a black
rock. Down its sides rushed with fearful noise a torrent of
poisonous water, which, insinuating itself through the soil,
penetrated to all the springs of the city, and rendered them unfit
for use. After he had been shewn all this, the stranger led him
into another large chamber, filled with gold and precious stones,
all of which he offered him if he would kneel down and worship
him, and consent to smear the doors and houses of Milan with a
pestiferous salve which he held out to him. He now knew him to be
the Devil, and in that moment of temptation, prayed to God to give
him strength to resist. His prayer was heard—he refused the bribe.
The stranger scowled horribly upon him—a loud clap of thunder
burst over his head—the vivid lightning flashed in his eyes, and
the next moment he found himself standing alone at the porch of
the cathedral. He repeated this strange tale day after day,
without any variation, and all the populace were firm believers in
its truth. Repeated search was made to discover the mysterious
house, but all in vain. The man pointed out several as resembling
it, which were searched by the police; but the Demon of the
Pestilence was not to be found, nor the hall of ghosts, nor the
poisonous fountain. But the minds of the people were so impressed
with the idea that scores of witnesses, half crazed by disease,
came forward to swear that they also had seen the diabolical
stranger, and had heard his chariot, drawn by the milk-white
steeds, rumbling over the streets at midnight with a sound louder
than thunder.

The number of persons who confessed that they were employed by the
Devil to distribute poison is almost incredible. An epidemic
frenzy was abroad, which seemed to be as contagious as the plague.
Imagination was as disordered as the body, and day after day
persons came voluntarily forward to accuse themselves. They
generally had the marks of disease upon them, and some died in the
act of confession.

During the great plague of London, in 1665, the people listened
with similar avidity to the predictions of quacks and fanatics.
Defoe says, that at that time the people were more addicted to
prophecies and astronomical conjurations, dreams, and old wives'
tales than ever they were before or since. Almanacs, and their
predictions, frightened them terribly. Even the year before the
plague broke out, they were greatly alarmed by the comet which
then appeared, and anticipated that famine, pestilence, or fire
would follow. Enthusiasts, while yet the disease had made but
little progress, ran about the streets, predicting that in a few
days London would be destroyed.

A still more singular instance of the faith in predictions
occurred in London in the year 1524. The city swarmed at that time
with fortune-tellers and astrologers, who were consulted daily by
people of every class in society on the secrets of futurity. As
early as the month of June 1523, several of them concurred in
predicting that, on the 1st day of February, 1524, the waters of
the Thames would swell to such a height as to overflow the whole
city of London, and wash away ten thousand houses. The prophecy
met implicit belief. It was reiterated with the utmost confidence
month after month, until so much alarm was excited that many
families packed up their goods, and removed into Kent and Essex.
As the time drew nigh, the number of these emigrants increased. In
January, droves of workmen might be seen, followed by their wives
and children, trudging on foot to the villages within fifteen or
twenty miles, to await the catastrophe. People of a higher class
were also to be seen in wagons and other vehicles bound on a
similar errand. By the middle of January, at least twenty thousand
persons had quitted the doomed city, leaving nothing but the bare
walls of their homes to be swept away by the impending floods.
Many of the richer sort took up their abode on the heights of
Highgate, Hampstead, and Blackheath; and some erected tents as far
away as Waltham Abbey on the north, and Croydon on the south of
the Thames. Bolton, the prior of St. Bartholomew's, was so
alarmed, that he erected, at very great expense, a sort of
fortress at Harrow-on-the-Hill, which he stocked with provisions
for two months. On the 24th of January, a week before the awful
day which was to see the destruction of London, he removed
thither, with the brethren and officers of the priory and all his
household. A number of boats were conveyed in wagons to his
fortress, furnished abundantly with expert rowers, in case the
flood, reaching so high as Harrow, should force them to go further
for a resting-place. Many wealthy citizens prayed to share his
retreat, but the prior, with a prudent forethought, admitted only
his personal friends, and those who brought stores of eatables for
the blockade.

At last the morn, big with the fate of London, appeared in the
east. The wondering crowds were astir at an early hour to watch
the rising of the waters. The inundation, it was predicted, would
be gradual, not sudden; so that they expected to have plenty of
time to escape, as soon as they saw the bosom of old Thames heave
beyond the usual mark. But the majority were too much alarmed to
trust to this, and thought themselves safer ten or twenty miles
off. The Thames, unmindful of the foolish crowds upon its banks,
flowed on quietly as of yore. The tide ebbed at its usual hour,
flowed to its usual height, and then ebbed again, just as if
twenty astrologers had not pledged their words to the contrary.
Blank were their faces as evening approached, and as blank grew
the faces of the citizens to think that they had made such fools
of themselves. At last night set in, and the obstinate river would
not lift its waters to sweep away even one house out of the ten
thousand. Still, however, the people were afraid to go to sleep.
Many hundreds remained up till dawn of the next day, lest the
deluge should come upon them like a thief in the night.

On the morrow, it was seriously discussed whether it would not be
advisable to duck the false prophets in the river. Luckily for
them, they thought of an expedient which allayed the popular fury.
They asserted that, by an error (a very slight one) of a little
figure, they had fixed the date of this awful inundation a whole
century too early. The stars were right after all, and they,
erring mortals, were wrong. The present generation of cockneys was
safe, and London would be washed away, not in 1524, but in 1624.
At this announcement, Bolton the prior, dismantled his fortress,
and the weary emigrants came back.

An eye-witness of the great fire of London, in an account
preserved among the Harleian Mss. in the British Museum, and
published in the transactions of the Royal Society of Antiquaries,
relates another instance of the credulity of the Londoners. The
writer, who accompanied the Duke of York day by day through the
district included between the Fleet-bridge and the Thames, states
that, in their efforts to check the progress of the flames, they
were much impeded by the superstition of the people. Mother
Shipton, in one of her prophecies, had said that London would be
reduced to ashes, and they refused to make any efforts to prevent
it.43* A son of the noted Sir Kenelm Digby, who was also a
pretender to the gifts of prophecy, persuaded them that no power
on earth could prevent the fulfilment of the prediction; for it
was written in the great book of fate that London was to be
destroyed. Hundreds of persons, who might have rendered valuable
assistance, and saved whole parishes from devastation, folded
their arms and looked on. As many more gave themselves up, with
the less compunction, to plunder a city which they could not
save.44*

The prophecies of Mother Shipton are still believed in many of the
rural districts of England. In cottages and servants' halls her
reputation is great; and she rules, the most popular of British
prophets, among all the uneducated, or half-educated, portions of
the community. She is generally supposed to have been born at
Knaresborough, in the reign of Henry VII, and to have sold her
soul to the Devil for the power of foretelling future events.
Though during her lifetime she was looked upon as a witch, she yet
escaped the witch's fate, and died peaceably in her bed at an
extreme old age, near Clifton in Yorkshire. A stone is said to
have been erected to her memory in the church-yard of that place,
with the following epitaph:

"Here lies she who never lied;
Whose skill often has been tried:
Her prophecies shall still survive,
And ever keep her name alive."

"Never a day passed," says her traditionary biography, "wherein
she did not relate something remarkable, and that required the
most serious consideration. People flocked to her from far and
near, her fame was so great. They went to her of all sorts, both
old and young, rich and poor, especially young maidens, to be
resolved of their doubts relating to things to come; and all
returned wonderfully satisfied in the explanations she gave to
their questions." Among the rest, went the Abbot of Beverley, to
whom she foretold the suppression of the monasteries by Henry
VIII; his marriage with Anne Boleyn; the fires for heretics in
Smithfield, and the execution of Mary Queen of Scots. She also
foretold the accession of James I, adding that, with him,

"From the cold North,
Every evil should come forth."

On a subsequent visit she uttered another prophecy, which, in the
opinion of her believers, still remains unfulfilled, but may be
expected to be realised during the present century:

"The time shall come when seas of blood
Shall mingle with a greater flood.
Great noise there shall be heard—great shouts and cries,
And seas shall thunder louder than the skies;
Then shall three lions fight with three and bring
Joy to a people, honour to a king.
That fiery year as soon as o'er,
Peace shall then be as before;
Plenty shall every where be found,
And men with swords shall plough the ground."

But the most famous of all her prophecies is one relating to
London. Thousands of persons still shudder to think of the woes
that are to burst over this unhappy realm, when London and
Highgate are joined by one continuous line of houses. This
junction, which, if the rage for building lasts much longer, in
the same proportion as heretofore, bids fair to be soon
accomplished, was predicted by her shortly before her death.
Revolutions—the fall of mighty monarchs, and the shedding of much
blood are to signalise that event. The very angels, afflicted by
our woes, are to turn aside their heads, and weep for hapless
Britain.

But great as is the fame of Mother Shipton, she ranks but second
in the list of British prophets. Merlin, the mighty Merlin, stands
alone in his high pre-eminence—the first and greatest. As old
Drayton sings, in his Poly-olbion:

"Of Merlin and his skill what region doth not hear?
The world shall still be full of Merlin every year.
A thousand lingering years his prophecies have run,
And scarcely shall have end till time itself be done."

Spenser, in his divine poem, has given us a powerful description
of this renowned seer—

"who had in magic more insight
Than ever him before, or after, living wight.
   For he by words could call out of the sky

Both sun and moon, and make them him obey;
   The land to sea, and sea to mainland dry,

And darksome night he eke could turn to day—
Huge hosts of men he could, alone, dismay.
   And hosts of men and meanest things could frame,

Whenso him list his enemies to fray,
   That to this day, for terror of his name,
The fiends do quake, when any him to them does name.
   And soothe men say that he was not the sonne

Of mortal sire or other living wighte,
   But wondrously begotten and begoune

By false illusion of a guileful sprite
On a faire ladye nun."

In these verses the poet has preserved the popular belief with
regard to Merlin, who is generally supposed to have been a
contemporary of Vortigern. Opinion is divided as to whether he
were a real personage, or a mere impersonation, formed by the
poetic fancy of a credulous people. It seems most probable that
such a man did exist, and that, possessing knowledge as much above
the comprehension of his age, as that possessed by Friar Bacon was
beyond the reach of his, he was endowed by the wondering crowd
with the supernatural attributes that Spenser has enumerated.

Geoffrey of Monmouth translated Merlin's poetical odes, or
prophecies, into Latin prose, and he was much reverenced not only
by Geoffrey, but by most of the old annalists. In a Life of
Merlin, with his Prophecies and Predictions interpreted and made
good by our English Annals, by Thomas Heywood, published in the
reign of Charles I, we find several of these pretended prophecies.
They seem, however, to have been all written by Heywood himself.
They are in terms too plain and positive to allow any one to doubt
for a moment of their having been composed ex post facto. Speaking
of Richard I, he says:

"The Lion's heart will 'gainst the Saracen rise,
And purchase from him many a glorious prize;
The rose and lily shall at first unite,
But, parting of the prey prove opposite.   *   *   *
But while abroad these great acts shall be done,
All things at home shall to disorder run.
Cooped up and caged then shall the Lion be,
But, after sufferance, ransomed and set free."

The simple-minded Thomas Heywood gravely goes on to inform us,
that all these things actually came to pass. Upon Richard III he
is equally luminous. He says:

"A hunch-backed monster, who with teeth is born,
The mockery of art and nature's scorn;
Who from the womb preposterously is hurled,
And, with feet forward, thrust into the world,
Shall, from the lower earth on which he stood,
Wade, every step he mounts, knee-deep in blood.
He shall to th' height of all his hopes aspire,
And, clothed in state, his ugly shape admire;
But, when he thinks himself most safe to stand,
From foreign parts a native whelp shall land."

Another of these prophecies after the event tells us that Henry
VIII should take the power from Rome, "and bring it home unto his
British bower;" that he should "root out from the land all the
razored skulls;" and that he should neither spare "man in his rage
nor woman in his lust;" and that, in the time of his next
successor but one, "there should come in the fagot and the stake."
Master Heywood closes Merlin's prophecies at his own day, and does
not give even a glimpse of what was to befall England after his
decease. Many other prophecies, besides those quoted by him, were,
he says, dispersed abroad, in his day, under the name of Merlin;
but he gives his readers a taste of one only, and that is the
following:

"When hempe is ripe and ready to pull,
Then, Englishman, beware thy skull."

This prophecy, which, one would think, ought to have put him in
mind of the gallows, at that time the not unusual fate of false
prophets, he explains thus: "In this word HEMPE be five letters.
Now, by reckoning the five successive princes from Henry VIII,
this prophecy is easily explained: H signifieth King Henry
before-named; E, Edward, his son, the sixth of that name; M, Mary,
who succeeded him; P, Philip of Spain, who, by marrying Queen
Mary, participated with her in the English diadem; and, lastly, E
signifieth Queen Elizabeth, after whose death there was a great
feare that some troubles might have arisen about the crown." As
this did not happen, Heywood, who was a sly rogue in a small way,
gets out of the scrape by saying, "Yet proved this augury true,
though not according to the former expectation; for, after the
peaceful inauguration of King James, there was great mortality,
not in London only, but through the whole kingdom, and from which
the nation was not quite clean in seven years after."

This is not unlike the subterfuge of Peter of Pontefract, who had
prophesied the death and deposition of King John, and who was
hanged by that monarch for his pains. A very graphic and amusing
account of this pretended prophet is given by Grafton, in his
Chronicles of England.45* "In the meanwhile," says he, "the
priestes within England had provided them a false and
counterfeated prophet, called Peter Wakefielde, a Yorkshire man,
who was an hermite, an idle gadder about, and a pratlyng marchant.
Now, to bring this Peter in credite, and the kyng out of all
credite with his people, diverse vaine persons bruted dayly among
the commons of the realme, that Christe had twice appered unto him
in the shape of a childe, betwene the prieste's handes, once at
Yorke, another tyme at Pomfret; and that he had breathed upon him
thrice, saying, 'Peace, peace, peace,' and teachyng many things,
which he anon declared to the bishops, and bid the people amend
their naughtie living. Being rapt also in spirite, they sayde he
behelde the joyes of heaven and sorowes of hell; for scant were
there three in the realme, sayde he, that lived christianly.

"This counterfeated soothsayer prophecied of King John, that he
should reigne no longer than the Ascension-day next followyng,
which was in the yere of our Lord 1211, and was the thirteenth
yere from his coronation; and this, he said, he had by revelation.
Then it was of him demanded, whether he should be slaine or be
deposed, or should voluntarily give over the crowne? He aunswered,
that he could not tell; but of this he was sure (he sayd), that
neither he nor any of his stock or lineage should reigne after
that day.

"The king hering of this, laughed much at it, and made but a scoff
thereat. 'Tush!' saith he, 'it is but an ideot knave, and such an
one as lacketh his right wittes.' But when this foolish prophet
had so escaped the daunger of the kinge's displeasure, and that he
made no more of it, he gate him abroad, and prated thereof at
large, as he was a very idle vagabond, and used to trattle and
talke more than ynough, so that they which loved the king caused
him anon after to be apprehended as a malefactor, and to be
throwen in prison, the king not yet knowing thereof.

"Anone after the fame of this phantasticall prophet went all the
realme over, and his name was knowen every where, as foolishnesse
is much regarded of the people, where wisdome is not in place;
specially because he was then imprisoned for the matter, the
rumour was the larger, their wonderynges were the wantoner, their
practises the foolisher, their busye talkes and other idle doinges
the greater. Continually from thence, as the rude manner of people
is, olde gossyps tales went abroade, new tales were invented,
fables were added to fables, and lyes grew upon lyes. So that
every daye newe slanders were laide upon the king, and not one of
them true. Rumors arose, blasphemyes were sprede, the enemyes
rejoyced, and treasons by the priestes were mainteyned; and what
lykewise was surmised, or other subtiltye practised, all was then
fathered upon this foolish prophet, as 'thus saith Peter
Wakefield;' 'thus hath he prophecied;' 'and thus it shall come to
pass;' yea, many times, when he thought nothing lesse. And when
the Ascension-day was come, which was prophecyed of before, King
John commanded his royal tent to be spread in the open fielde,
passing that day with his noble counseyle and men of honour, in
the greatest solemnitie that ever he did before; solacing himself
with musickale instrumentes and songs, most in sight among his
trustie friendes. When that day was paste in all prosperitie and
myrth, his enemyes being confused, turned all into an allegorical
understanding to make the prophecie good, and sayde, 'he is no
longer king, for the pope reigneth, and not he.' [King John was
labouring under a sentence of excommunication at the time.]

"Then was the king by his council perswaded that this false
prophet had troubled the realme, perverted the heartes of the
people, and raysed the Commons against him; for his wordes went
over the sea, by the help of his prelates, and came to the French
king's eare, and gave to him a great encouragement to invade the
lande. He had not else done it so sodeinely. But he was most fowly
deceived, as all they are and shall be that put their trust in
such dark drowsye dreames of hipocrites. The king therefore
commanded that he should be hanged up, and his sonne also with
him, lest any more false prophets should arise of that race."

Heywood, who was a great stickler for the truth of all sorts of
prophecies, gives a much more favourable account of this Peter of
Pomfret, or Pontefract, whose fate he would, in all probability,
have shared, if he had had the misfortune to have flourished in
the same age. He says, that Peter, who was not only a prophet, but
a bard, predicted divers of King John's disasters, which fell out
accordingly. On being taxed for a lying prophet in having
predicted that the king would be deposed before he entered into
the fifteenth year of his reign, he answered him boldly, that all
he had said was justifiable and true; for that, having given up
his crown to the pope, and paying him an annual tribute, the pope
reigned, and not he. Heywood thought this explanation to be
perfectly satisfactory, and the prophet's faith for ever
established.

But to return to Merlin. Of him even to this day it may be said,
in the words which Burns has applied to another notorious
personage,

"Great was his power and great his fame;
Far kenned and noted is his name."

His reputation is by no means confined to the land of his birth,
but extends through most of the nations of Europe. A very curious
volume of his Life, Prophecies, and Miracles, written, it is
supposed, by Robert de Bosron, was printed at Paris in 1498, which
states, that the devil himself was his father, and that he spoke
the instant he was born, and assured his mother, a very virtuous
young woman, that she should not die in child-bed with him, as her
ill-natured neighbours had predicted. The judge of the district,
hearing of so marvellous an occurrence, summoned both mother and
child to appear before him; and they went accordingly the same
day. To put the wisdom of the young prophet most effectually to
the test, the judge asked him if he knew his own father? To which
the infant Merlin replied, in a clear, sonorous voice, "Yes, my
father is the Devil; and I have his power, and know all things,
past, present, and to come." His worship clapped his hands in
astonishment, and took the prudent resolution of not molesting so
awful a child, or its mother either.

Early tradition attributes the building of Stonehenge to the power
of Merlin. It was believed that those mighty stones were whirled
through the air, at his command, from Ireland to Salisbury Plain;
and that he arranged them in the form in which they now stand, to
commemorate for ever the unhappy fate of three hundred British
chiefs, who were massacred on that spot by the Saxons.

At Abergwylly, near Carmarthen, is still shewn the cave of the
prophet and the scene of his incantations. How beautiful is the
description of it given by Spenser in his Faerie Queene! The lines
need no apology for their repetition here, and any sketch of the
great prophet of Britain would be incomplete without them:

    "There the wise Merlin, whilom wont (they say,)

To make his wonne low underneath the ground,
    In a deep delve far from the view of day,

That of no living wight he mote be found,
Whenso he counselled with his sprites encompassed round.
  And if thou ever happen that same way
To travel, go to see that dreadful place;
    It is a hideous, hollow cave, they say,
Under a rock that lies a little space
From the swift Barry, tumbling down apace
    Amongst the woody hills of Dynevoure;
But dare thou not, I charge, in any case,
  To enter into that same baleful bower,
For fear the cruel fiendes should thee unwares devour!
  But, standing high aloft, low lay thine eare,
And there such ghastly noise of iron chaines,
    And brazen caudrons thou shalt rombling heare,
Which thousand sprites, with long-enduring paines,
Doe tosse, that it will stun thy feeble braines;
    And often times great groans and grievous stownds,
When too huge toile and labour them constraines;
  And often times loud strokes and ringing sounds
From under that deep rock most horribly rebounds.
  The cause, they say, is this. A little while
Before that Merlin died, he did intend
    A brazen wall in compass, to compile
About Cayr Merdin, and did it commend
Unto these sprites to bring to perfect end;
    During which work the Lady of the Lake,
Whom long he loved, for him in haste did send,
  Who thereby forced his workmen to forsake,
Them bound till his return their labour not to slake.
  In the mean time, through that false ladie's traine,
He was surprised, and buried under biere,
  Ne ever to his work returned again;
Natheless these fiendes may not their work forbeare,
So greatly his commandement they fear,
  But there doe toile and travaile day and night,
Until that brazen wall they up doe reare."46*

Amongst other English prophets, a belief in whose power has not
been entirely effaced by the light of advancing knowledge, is
Robert Nixon, the Cheshire idiot, a contemporary of Mother
Shipton. The popular accounts of this man say, that he was born of
poor parents, not far from Vale Royal, on the edge of the forest
of Delamere. He was brought up to the plough, but was so ignorant
and stupid, that nothing could be made of him. Every body thought
him irretrievably insane, and paid no attention to the strange,
unconnected discourses which he held. Many of his prophecies are
believed to have been lost in this manner. But they were not
always destined to be wasted upon dull and inattentive ears. An
incident occurred which brought him into notice, and established
his fame as a prophet of the first calibre. He was ploughing in a
field when he suddenly stopped from his labour, and with a wild
look and strange gesture, exclaimed, "Now, Dick! now, Harry! O,
ill done, Dick! O, well done, Harry! Harry has gained the day!"
His fellow labourers in the field did not know what to make of
this rhapsody; but the next day cleared up the mystery. News was
brought by a messenger, in hot haste, that at the very instant
when Nixon had thus ejaculated, Richard III had been slain at the
battle of Bosworth, and Henry VII proclaimed king of England.

It was not long before the fame of the new prophet reached the
ears of the king, who expressed a wish to see and converse with
him. A messenger was accordingly despatched to bring him to court;
but long before he reached Cheshire, Nixon knew and dreaded the
honours that awaited him. Indeed it was said, that at the very
instant the king expressed the wish, Nixon was, by supernatural
means, made acquainted with it, and that he ran about the town of
Over in great distress of mind, calling out, like a madman, that
Henry had sent for him, and that he must go to court, and be
clammed, that is, starved to death. These expressions excited no
little wonder; but, on the third day, the messenger arrived, and
carried him to court, leaving on the minds of the good people of
Cheshire an impression that their prophet was one of the greatest
ever born. On his arrival King Henry appeared to be troubled
exceedingly at the loss of a valuable diamond, and asked Nixon if
he could inform him where it was to be found. Henry had hidden the
diamond himself, with a view to test the prophet's skill. Great,
therefore, was his surprise when Nixon answered him in the words
of the old proverb, "Those who hide can find." From that time
forth the king implicitly believed that he had the gift of
prophecy, and ordered all his words to be taken down.

During all the time of his residence at court he was in constant
fear of being starved to death, and repeatedly told the king that
such would be his fate, if he were not allowed to depart, and
return into his own country. Henry would not suffer it, but gave
strict orders to all his officers and cooks to give him as much to
eat as he wanted. He lived so well, that for some time he seemed
to be thriving like a nobleman's steward, and growing as fat as an
alderman. One day the king went out hunting, when Nixon ran to the
palace gate, and entreated on his knees that he might not be left
behind to be starved. The king laughed, and calling an officer,
told him to take especial care of the prophet during his absence,
and rode away to the forest. After his departure, the servants of
the palace began to jeer at and insult Nixon, whom they imagined
to be much better treated than he deserved. Nixon complained to
the officer, who, to prevent him from being further molested,
locked him up in the king's own closet, and brought him regularly
his four meals a day. But it so happened that a messenger arrived
from the king to this officer, requiring his immediate presence at
Winchester, on a matter of life and death. So great was his haste
to obey the king's command, that he mounted on the horse behind
the messenger, and rode off, without bestowing a thought upon poor
Nixon. He did not return till three days afterwards, when,
remembering the prophet for the first time, he went to the king's
closet, and found him lying upon the floor, starved to death, as
he had predicted.

Among the prophecies of his which are believed to have been
fulfilled, are the following, which relate to the times of the
Pretender:

"A great man shall come into England,
But the son of a king
Shall take from him the victory."
"Crows shall drink the blood of many nobles,
And the North shall rise against the South."
"The cock of the North shall be made to flee,
And his feather be plucked for his pride,
That he shall almost curse the day that he was born."

All these, say his admirers, are as clear as the sun at noon-day.
The first denotes the defeat of Prince Charles Edward, at the
battle of Culloden, by the Duke of Cumberland; the second, the
execution of Lords Derwentwater, Balmerino, and Lovat; and the
third, the retreat of the Pretender from the shores of Britain.
Among the prophecies that still remain to be accomplished, are the
following:

"Between seven, eight, and nine,
In England wonders shall be seen;
Between nine and thirteen
All sorrow shall be done.!"
"Through our own money and our men
Shall a dreadful war begin.
Between the sickle and the suck
All England shall have a pluck,"

"Foreign nations shall invade England with snow on their helmets,
and shall bring plague, famine, and murder in the skirts of their
garments."

"The town of Nantwich shall be swept away by a flood."

Of the two first of these no explanation has yet been attempted;
but some event or other will doubtless be twisted into such a
shape as will fit them. The third, relative to the invasion of
England by a nation with snow on their helmets, is supposed by the
old women to foretell most clearly the coming war with Russia. As
to the last, there are not a few in the town mentioned who
devoutly believe that such will be its fate. Happily for their
peace of mind, the prophet said nothing of the year that was to
witness the awful calamity; so that they think it as likely to be
two centuries hence as now.

The popular biographers of Nixon conclude their account of him by
saying, that "his prophecies are by some persons thought fables;
yet by what has come to pass, it is now thought, and very plainly
appears, that most of them have proved, or will prove, true; for
which we, on all occasions, ought not only to exert our utmost
might to repel by force our enemies, but to refrain from our
abandoned and wicked course of life, and to make our continual
prayer to God for protection and safety." To this, though a non
sequitur, every one will cry, Amen!

Besides the prophets, there have been the almanac-makers Lilly,
Poor Robin, Partridge, and Francis Moore physician, in England and
Matthew Laensbergh, in France and Belgium. But great as were their
pretensions, they were modesty itself in comparison with Merlin,
Shipton, and Nixon, who fixed their minds upon higher things than
the weather, and who were not so restrained in their flights of
fancy as to prophesy for only one year at a time. After such
prophets the almanac-makers hardly deserve to be mentioned; not
even the renowned Partridge, whose prognostications set all
England agog in 1708, and whose death while still alive was so
pleasantly and satisfactorily proved by Isaac Bickerstaff. The
anti-climax would be too palpable, and they and their doings must
be left uncommemorated.



      Chapter 6 - Fortune-Telling

And men still grope t' anticipate
The cabinet designs of Fate;
Apply to wizards to foresee
What shall and what shall never be.
Hudibras, part iii. canto 3.

IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE PLAN laid down, we proceed to the
consideration of the follies into which men have been led by their
eager desire to pierce the thick darkness of futurity. God
himself, for his own wise purposes, has more than once undrawn the
impenetrable veil which shrouds those awful secrets; and, for
purposes just as wise, he has decreed that, except in these
instances, ignorance shall be our lot for ever. It is happy for
man that he does not know what the morrow is to bring forth; but,
unaware of this great blessing, he has, in all ages of the world,
presumptuously endeavoured to trace the events of unborn
centuries, and anticipate the march of time. He has reduced this
presumption into a study. He has divided it into sciences and
systems without number, employing his whole life in the vain
pursuit. Upon no subject has it been so easy to deceive the world
as upon this. In every breast the curiosity exists in a greater or
less degree, and can only be conquered by a long course of
self-examination, and a firm reliance that the future would not be
hidden from our sight, if it were right that we should be
acquainted with it.

An undue opinion of our own importance in the scale of creation is
at the bottom of all our unwarrantable notions in this respect.
How flattering to the pride of man to think that the stars in
their courses watch over him, and typify, by their movements and
aspects, the joys or the sorrows that await him! He, less in
proportion to the universe than the all-but invisible insects that
feed in myriads on a summer's leaf are to this great globe itself,
fondly imagines that eternal worlds were chiefly created to
prognosticate his fate. How we should pity the arrogance of the
worm that crawls at our feet, if we knew that it also desired to
know the secrets of futurity, and imagined that meteors shot
athwart the sky to warn it that a tom-tit was hovering near to
gobble it up; that storms and earthquakes, the revolutions of
empires, or the fall of mighty monarchs, only happened to predict
its birth, its progress, and its decay! Not a whit less presuming
has man shewn himself; not a whit less arrogant are the sciences,
so called, of astrology, augury, necromancy, geomancy, palmistry,
and divination of every kind.

Leaving out of view the oracles of pagan antiquity and religious
predictions in general, and confining ourselves solely to the
persons who, in modern times, have made themselves most
conspicuous in foretelling the future, we shall find that the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were the golden age of these
impostors. Many of them have been already mentioned in their
character of alchymists. The union of the two pretensions is not
at all surprising. It was to be expected that those who assumed a
power so preposterous as that of prolonging the life of man for
several centuries, should pretend, at the same time, to foretell
the events which were to mark that preternatural span of
existence. The world would as readily believe that they had
discovered all secrets, as that they had only discovered one. The
most celebrated astrologers of Europe, three centuries ago, were
alchymists. Agrippa, Paracelsus, Dr. Dee, and the Rosicrucians,
all laid as much stress upon their knowledge of the days to come,
as upon their pretended possession of the philosopher's stone and
the elixir of life. In their time, ideas of the wonderful, the
diabolical, and the supernatural, were rifer than ever they were
before. The devil or the stars were universally believed to meddle
constantly in the affairs of men; and both were to be consulted
with proper ceremonies. Those who were of a melancholy and gloomy
temperament betook themselves to necromancy and sorcery; those
more cheerful and aspiring, devoted themselves to astrology. The
latter science was encouraged by all the monarchs and governments
of that age. In England, from the time of Elizabeth to that of
William and Mary, judicial astrology was in high repute. During
that period flourished Drs. Dee, Lamb, and Forman; with Lilly,
Booker, Gadbury, Evans, and scores of nameless impostors in every
considerable town and village in the country, who made it their
business to cast nativities, aid in the recovery of stolen goods,
prognosticate happy or unhappy marriages, predict whether journeys
would be prosperous, and note lucky moments for the commencement
of any enterprise, from the setting up of a cobbler's shop to the
marching of an army. Men who, to use the words of Butler, did

"Deal in Destiny's dark counsel,
And sage opinion of the moon sell;
To whom all people far and near
On deep importance did repair,
When brass and pewter pots did stray,
And linen slunk out of the way."

In Lilly's Memoirs of his Life and Times, there are many notices
of the inferior quacks who then abounded, and upon whom he
pretended to look down with supreme contempt; not because they
were astrologers, but because they debased that noble art by
taking fees for the recovery of stolen property. From Butler's
Hudibras, and its curious notes, we may learn what immense numbers
of these fellows lived upon the credulity of mankind in that age
of witchcraft and diablerie. Even in our day, how great is the
reputation enjoyed by the almanac-makers, who assume the name of
Francis Moore. But in the time of Charles I and the Commonwealth
the most learned, the most noble, and the most conspicuous
characters did not hesitate to consult astrologers in the most
open manner. Lilly, whom Butler has immortalized under the name of
Sydrophel, relates, that he proposed to write a work called An
Introduction to Astrology, in which he would satisfy the whole
kingdom of the lawfulness of that art. Many of the soldiers were
for it, he says, and many of the Independent party, and abundance
of worthy men in the House of Commons, his assured friends, and
able to take his part against the Presbyterians, who would have
silenced his predictions if they could. He afterwards carried his
plan into execution, and when his book was published, went with
another astrologer named Booker to the headquarters of the
parliamentary army at Windsor, where they were welcomed and
feasted in the garden where General Fairfax lodged. They were
afterwards introduced to the general, who received them very
kindly, and made allusion to some of their predictions. He hoped
their art was lawful and agreeable to God's word; but he did not
understand it himself. He did not doubt, however, that the two
astrologers feared God, and therefore he had a good opinion of
them. Lilly assured him that the art of astrology was quite
consonant to the Scriptures; and confidently predicted from his
knowledge of the stars, that the parliamentary army would
overthrow all its enemies. In Oliver's Protectorate, this quack
informs us that he wrote freely enough. He became an Independent,
and all the soldiery were his friends. When he went to Scotland,
he saw a soldier standing in front of the army with a book of
prophecies in his hand, exclaiming to the several companies as
they passed by him, "Lo! hear what Lilly saith: you are in this
month promised victory! Fight it out, brave boys! and then read
that month's prediction!"

After the great fire of London, which Lilly said he had foretold,
he was sent for by the committee of the House of Commons appointed
to inquire into the causes of the calamity. In his Monarchy or no
Monarchy, published in 1651, he had inserted an hieroglyphical
plate representing on one side persons in winding-sheets digging
graves; and on the other a large city in flames. After the great
fire, some sapient member of the legislature bethought him of
Lilly's book, and having mentioned it in the house, it was agreed
that the astrologer should be summoned. Lilly attended
accordingly, when Sir Robert Brooke told him the reason of his
summons, and called upon him to declare what he knew. This was a
rare opportunity for the vain-glorious Lilly to vaunt his
abilities; and he began a long speech in praise of himself and his
pretended science. He said that, after the execution of Charles I,
he was extremely desirous to know what might from that time forth
happen to the parliament and to the nation in general. He
therefore consulted the stars, and satisfied himself. The result
of his judgment he put into emblems and hieroglyphics, without any
commentary, so that the true meaning might be concealed from the
vulgar, and made manifest only to the wise; imitating in this the
example of many wise philosophers who had done the like.

"Did you foresee the year of the fire?" said a member. "No," quoth
Lilly, "nor was I desirous. Of that I made no scrutiny." After
some further parley, the house found they could make nothing of
the astrologer, and dismissed him with great civility.

One specimen of the explanation of a prophecy given by Lilly, and
related by him with much complacency, will be sufficient to shew
the sort of trash by which he imposed upon the million. "In the
year 1588," says he, "there was a prophecy printed in Greek
characters, exactly deciphering the long troubles of the English
nation from 1641 to 1660." And it ended thus: "And after him shall
come a dreadful dead man, and with him a royal G, of the best
blood in the world, and he shall have the crown, and shall set
England on the right way, and put out all heresies." The following
is the explanation of this oracular absurdity:

"Monkery being extinguished above eighty or ninety years, and the
Lord General's name being Monk, is the dead man. The royal G or C
[it is gamma in the Greek, intending C in the Latin, being the
third letter in the alphabet] is Charles II, who for his
extraction may be said to be of the best blood of the world."

In France and Germany astrologers met even more encouragement than
they received in England. In very early ages, Charlemagne and his
successors fulminated their wrath against them in common with
sorcerers. Louis XI, that most superstitious of men, entertained
great numbers of them at his court; and Catherine de Medicis, that
most superstitious of women, hardly ever took any affair of
importance without consulting them. She chiefly favoured her own
countrymen; and during the time she governed France, the land was
overrun by Italian conjurors, necromancers, and fortune-tellers of
every kind. But the chief astrologer of that day, beyond all
doubt, was the celebrated Nostradamus, physician to her husband,
King Henry II. He was born in 1503, at the town of St. Remi, in
Provence, where his father was a notary. He did not acquire much
fame till he was past his fiftieth year, when his famous
Centuries, a collection of verses, written in obscure and almost
unintelligible language, began to excite attention. They were so
much spoken of in 1556, that Henry II resolved to attach so
skilful a man to his service, and appointed him his physician. In
a biographical notice of him prefixed to the edition of his Vraies
Centuries, published at Amsterdam in 1668, we are informed that he
often discoursed with his royal master on the secrets of futurity,
and received many great presents as his reward, besides his usual
allowance for medical attendance. After the death of Henry he
retired to his native place, where Charles IX paid him a visit in
1564; and was so impressed with veneration for his wondrous
knowledge of the things that were to be, not in France only, but
in the whole world for hundreds of years to come, that he made him
a counsellor of state and his own physician, besides treating him
in other matters with a royal liberality. "In fine," continues his
biographer, "I should be too prolix were I to tell all the honours
conferred upon him, and all the great nobles and learned men that
arrived at his house from the very ends of the earth, to see and
converse with him as if he had been an oracle. Many strangers, in
fact, came to France for no other purpose than to consult him."

The prophecies of Nostradamus consist of upwards of a thousand
stanzas, each of four lines, and are to the full as obscure as the
oracles of old. They take so great a latitude, both as to time and
space, that they are almost sure to be fulfilled somewhere or
other in the course of a few centuries. A little ingenuity like
that evinced by Lilly, in his explanation about General Monk and
the dreadful dead man, might easily make events to fit some of
them.47*

He is to this day extremely popular in France and the Walloon
country of Belgium, where old farmer-wives consult him with great
confidence and assiduity.

Catherine di Medicis was not the only member of her illustrious
house who entertained astrologers. At the beginning of the
fifteenth century, there was a man, named Basil, residing in
Florence, who was noted over all Italy for his skill in piercing
the darkness of futurity. It is said that he foretold to Cosmo di
Medicis, then a private citizen, that he would attain high
dignity, inasmuch as the ascendant of his nativity was adorned
with the same propitious aspects as those of Augustus Caesar and
the Emperor Charles V.48* Another astrologer foretold the death of
Prince Alexander di Medicis; and so very minute and particular was
he in all the circumstances, that he was suspected of being
chiefly instrumental in fulfilling his own prophecy—a very common
resource with these fellows, to keep up their credit. He foretold
confidently that the prince should die by the hand of his own
familiar friend, a person of a slender habit of body, a small
face, a swarthy complexion, and of most remarkable taciturnity. So
it afterwards happened, Alexander having been murdered in his
chamber by his cousin Lorenzo, who corresponded exactly with the
above description.49* The author of Hermippus Redivivus, in
relating this story, inclines to the belief that the astrologer
was guiltless of any participation in the crime, but was employed
by some friend of Prince Alexander, to warn him of his danger.

A much more remarkable story is told of an astrologer who lived in
Romagna, in the fifteenth century, and whose name was Antiochus
Tibertus.50* At that time nearly all the petty sovereigns of Italy
retained such men in their service; and Tibertus, having studied
the mathematics with great success at Paris, and delivered many
predictions, some of which, for guesses, were not deficient in
shrewdness, was taken into the household of Pandolfo di Malatesta,
the sovereign of Rimini. His reputation was so great, that his
study was continually thronged either with visitors who were
persons of distinction, or with clients who came to him for
advice; and in a short time he acquired a considerable fortune.
Notwithstanding all these advantages, he passed his life
miserably, and ended it on the scaffold. The following story
afterwards got into circulation, and has been often triumphantly
cited by succeeding astrologers as an irrefragable proof of the
truth of their science. It was said, that long before he died he
uttered three remarkable prophecies—one relating to himself,
another to his friend, and the third to his patron, Pandolfo di
Malatesta. The first delivered was that relating to his friend
Guido di Bogni, one of the greatest captains of the time. Guido
was exceedingly desirous to know his fortune, and so importuned
Tibertus, that the latter consulted the stars and the lines on his
palm to satisfy him. He afterwards told him with a sorrowful face,
that, according to all the rules of astrology and palmistry, he
should be falsely suspected by his best friend, and should lose
his life in consequence. Guido then asked the astrologer if he
could foretell his own fate; upon which Tibertus again consulted
the stars, and found that it was decreed from all eternity that he
should end his days on the scaffold. Malatesta, when he heard
these predictions, so unlikely, to all present appearance, to
prove true, desired his astrologer to predict his fate also, and
to hide nothing from him, however unfavourable it might be.
Tibertus complied, and told his patron, at that time one of the
most flourishing and powerful princes of Italy, that he should
suffer great want, and die at last like a beggar in the common
hospital of Bologna. And so it happened in all three cases. Guido
di Bogni was accused by his own father-in-law, the Count di
Bentivoglio, of a treasonable design to deliver up the city of
Rimini to the papal forces, and was assassinated afterwards, by
order of the tyrant Malatesta, as he sat at the supper-table, to
which he had been invited in all apparent friendship. The
astrologer was at the same time thrown into prison, as being
concerned in the treason of his friend. He attempted to escape,
and had succeeded in letting himself down from his dungeon-window
into a moat, when he was discovered by the sentinels. This being
reported to Malatesta, he gave orders for his execution on the
following morning.

Malatesta had, at this time, no remembrance of the prophecy; and
his own fate gave him no uneasiness: but events were silently
working its fulfilment. A conspiracy had been formed, though Guido
di Bogni was innocent of it, to deliver up Rimini to the pope; and
all the necessary measures having been taken, the city was seized
by the Count de Valentinois. In the confusion, Malatesta had
barely time to escape from his palace in disguise. He was pursued
from place to place by his enemies, abandoned by all his former
friends, and, finally, by his own children. He at last fell ill of
a languishing disease, at Bologna; and, nobody caring to afford
him shelter, he was carried to the hospital, where he died. The
only thing that detracts from the interest of this remarkable
story is the fact, that the prophecy was made after the event.

For some weeks before the birth of Louis XIV, an astrologer from
Germany, who had been sent for by the Marshal de Bassompierre and
other noblemen of the court, had taken up his residence in the
palace, to be ready, at a moment's notice, to draw the horoscope
of the future sovereign of France. When the queen was taken in
labour, he was ushered into a contiguous apartment, that he might
receive notice of the very instant the child was born. The result
of his observations were the three words, diu, durè, feliciter;
meaning, that the new-born prince should live and reign long, with
much labour, and with great glory. No prediction less favourable
could have been expected from an astrologer, who had his bread to
get, and who was at the same time a courtier. A medal was
afterwards struck in commemoration of the event; upon one side of
which was figured the nativity of the prince, representing him as
driving the chariot of Apollo, with the inscription "Ortus solis
Gallici,"—the rising of the Gallic sun.

The best excuse ever made for astrology was that offered by the
great astronomer, Kepler, himself an unwilling practiser of the
art. He had many applications from his friends to cast nativities
for them, and generally gave a positive refusal to such as he was
not afraid of offending by his frankness. In other cases he
accommodated himself to the prevailing delusion. In sending a copy
of his Ephemerides to Professor Gerlach, he wrote, that they were
nothing but worthless conjectures; but he was obliged to devote
himself to them, or he would have starved. "Ye overwise
philosophers," he exclaimed, in his Tertius Interveniens; "ye
censure this daughter of astronomy beyond her deserts! Know ye not
that she must support her mother by her charms? The scanty reward
of an astronomer would not provide him with bread, if men did not
entertain hopes of reading the future in the heavens."

NECROMANCY was, next to astrology, the pretended science most
resorted to, by those who wished to pry into the future. The
earliest instance upon record is that of the witch of Endor and
the spirit of Samuel. Nearly all the nations of antiquity believed
in the possibility of summoning departed ghosts to disclose the
awful secrets that God made clear to the disembodied. Many
passages in allusion to this subject will at once suggest
themselves to the classical reader; but this art was never carried
on openly in any country. All governments looked upon it as a
crime of the deepest dye. While astrology was encouraged, and its
professors courted and rewarded, necromancers were universally
condemned to the stake or the gallows. Roger Bacon, Albertus
Magnus, Arnold of Villeneuve, and many others, were accused by the
public opinion of many centuries, of meddling in these unhallowed
matters. So deep-rooted has always been the popular delusion with
respect to accusations of this kind, that no crime was ever
disproved with such toil and difficulty. That it met great
encouragement, nevertheless, is evident from the vast numbers of
pretenders to it; who, in spite of the danger, have existed in all
ages and countries.

GEOMANCY, or the art of foretelling the future by means of lines
and circles, and other mathematical figures drawn on the earth, is
still extensively practised in Asiatic countries, but is almost
unknown in Europe.

AUGURY, from the flight or entrails of birds, so favourite a study
among the Romans, is, in like manner, exploded in Europe. Its most
assiduous professors, at the present day, are the abominable Thugs
of India.

DIVINATION, of which there are many kinds, boasts a more enduring
reputation. It has held an empire over the minds of men from the
earliest periods of recorded history, and is, in all probability,
coeval with time itself. It was practised alike by the Jews, the
Egyptians, the Chaldeans, the Persians, the Greeks, and the
Romans; is equally known to all modern nations, in every part of
the world; and is not unfamiliar to the untutored tribes that roam
in the wilds of Africa and America. Divination, as practised in
civilized Europe at the present day, is chiefly from cards, the
tea-cup, and the lines on the palm of the hand. Gipsies alone make
a profession of it; but there are thousands and tens of thousands
of humble families in which the good-wife, and even the good-man,
resort to the grounds at the bottom of their teacups, to know
whether the next harvest will be abundant, or their sow bring
forth a numerous litter; and in which the young maidens look to
the same place to know when they are to be married, and whether
the man of their choice is to be dark or fair, rich or poor, kind
or cruel. Divination by cards, so great a favourite among the
moderns, is, of course, a modern science; as cards do not yet
boast an antiquity of much more than four hundred years.
Divination by the palm, so confidently believed in by half the
village lasses in Europe, is of older date, and seems to have been
known to the Egyptians in the time of the patriarchs; as well as
divination by the cup, which, as we are informed in Genesis, was
practised by Joseph. Divination by the rod was also practised by
the Egyptians. In comparatively recent times, it was pretended
that by this means hidden treasures could be discovered. It now
appears to be altogether exploded in Europe. Onomancy, or the
foretelling a man's fate by the letters of his name, and the
various transpositions of which they are capable, is a more modern
sort of divination; but it reckons comparatively few believers.

The following list of the various species of Divination formerly
in use, is given by Gaule, in his Magastromancer, and quoted in
Hone's Year-Book, p. 1517.

Stareomancy, or divining by the elements.
Aeromancy, or divining by the air.
Pyromancy, by fire.
Hydromancy, by water.
Geomancy, by earth.
Theomancy, pretending to divine by the revelation of the Spirit, and by
the Scriptures, or word of God.
Demonomancy, by the aid of devils and evil spirits.
Idolomancy, by idols, images, and figures.
Psychomancy, by the soul, affections, or dispositions of men.
Anthropomancy, by the entrails of human beings.
Theriomancy, by beasts.
Ornithomancy, by birds.
Icthyomancy, by fishes.
Botanomancy, by herbs.
Lithomancy, by stones.
Kleromancy, by lots.
Oneiromancy, by dreams.
Onomancy, by names.
Arithmancy, by numbers.
Logarithmancy, by logarithms.
Sternomancy, by the marks from the breast to the belly.
Gastromancy, by the sound of, or marks upon, the belly.
Omphelomancy, by the navel.
Chiromancy, by the hands.
Podomancy, by the feet.
Onchyomancy, by the nails.
Cephaleonomancy, by asses' heads.
Tephromancy, by ashes.
Kapnomancy, by smoke.
Knissomancy, by the burning of incense.
Ceromancy, by the melting of wax.
Lecanomancy, by basins of water.
Katoptromancy, by looking-glasses.
Chartomancy, by writing in papers, and by Valentines.
Macharomancy, by knives and swords.
Crystallomancy, by crystals.
Dactylomancy, by rings.
Koskinomancy, by sieves.
Axinomancy, by saws.
Chalcomancy, by vessels of brass, or other metal.
Spatilomancy, by skins, bones, &c.
Astromancy, by stars.
Sciomancy, by shadows.
Astragalomancy, by dice.
Oinomancy, by the lees of wine.
Sycomancy, by figs.
Tyromancy, by cheese.
Alphitomancy, by meal, flour, or bran.
Krithomancy, by corn or grain.
Alectromancy, by cocks.
Gyromancy, by circles.
Lampadomancy, by candles and lamps.

ONEIRO-CRITICISM, or the art of interpreting dreams, is a relic of
the most remote ages, which has subsisted through all the changes
that moral or physical revolutions have operated in the world. The
records of five thousand years bear abundant testimony to the
universal diffusion of the belief, that the skilful could read the
future in dreams. The rules of the art, if any existed in ancient
times, are not known; but in our day, one simple rule opens the
whole secret. Dreams, say all the wiseacres in Christendom, are to
be interpreted by contraries. Thus, if you dream of filth, you
will acquire something valuable; if you dream of the dead, you
will hear news of the living; if you dream of gold and silver, you
run a risk of being without either; and if you dream you have many
friends, you will be persecuted by many enemies. The rule,
however, does not hold good in all cases. It is fortunate to dream
of little pigs, but unfortunate to dream of big bullocks. If you
dream you have lost a tooth, you may be sure that you will shortly
lose a friend; and if you dream that your house is on fire, you
will receive news from a far country. If you dream of vermin, it
is a sign that there will be sickness in your family; and if you
dream of serpents, you will have friends who, in the course of
time, will prove your bitterest enemies; but, of all dreams, it is
most fortunate if you dream that you are wallowing up to your neck
in mud and mire. Clear water is a sign of grief; and great
troubles, distress, and perplexity are predicted, if you dream
that you stand naked in the public streets, and know not where to
find a garment to shield you from the gaze of the multitude.

In many parts of Great Britain, and the continents of Europe and
America, there are to be found elderly women in the villages and
country-places whose interpretations of dreams are looked upon
with as much reverence as if they were oracles. In districts
remote from towns it is not uncommon to find the members of a
family regularly every morning narrating their dreams at the
breakfast-table, and becoming happy or miserable for the day
according to their interpretation. There is not a flower that
blossoms, or fruit that ripens, that, dreamed of, is not ominous
of either good or evil to such people. Every tree of the field or
the forest is endowed with a similar influence over the fate of
mortals, if seen in the night-visions. To dream of the ash, is the
sign of a long journey; and of an oak, prognosticates long life
and prosperity. To dream you strip the bark off any tree, is a
sign to a maiden of an approaching loss of a character; to a
married woman, of a family bereavement; and to a man, of an
accession of fortune. To dream of a leafless tree, is a sign of
great sorrow; and of a branchless trunk, a sign of despair and
suicide. The elder-tree is more auspicious to the sleeper; while
the fir-tree, better still, betokens all manner of comfort and
prosperity. The lime-tree predicts a voyage across the ocean;
while the yew and the alder are ominous of sickness to the young
and of death to the old.51* Among the flowers and fruits charged
with messages for the future, the following is a list of the most
important, arranged from approved sources, in alphabetical order:
Asparagus, gathered and tied up in bundles, is an omen of tears.
If you see it growing in your dreams, it is a sign of good
fortune.

Aloes, without a flower, betokens long life: in flower, betokens a legacy.
Artichokes. This vegetable is a sign that you will receive, in a short
time, a favour from the hands of those from whom you would least expect it.
Agrimony. This herb denotes that there will be sickness in your house.
Anemone predicts love.
Auriculas, in beds, denote luck; in pots, marriage: while to gather them,
foretells widowhood.
Bilberries predict a pleasant excursion.
Broom-flowers an increase of family.
Cauliflowers predict that all your friends will slight you, or that you
will fall into poverty and find no one to pity you.
Dock-leaves, a present from the country.
Daffodils. Any maiden who dreams of daffodils is warned by her good angel
to avoid going into a wood with her lover, or into any dark or retired
place where she might not be able to make people hear her if she cried out.
Alas for her if she pay no attention to the warning!
"Never again shall she put garland on;
Instead of it, she'll wear sad cypress now,
And bitter elder broken from the bough."
Figs, if green, betoken embarrassment; if dried, money to the poor and
mirth to the rich.
Heart's-ease betokens heart's pain.
Lilies predict joy; water-lilies, danger from the sea.
Lemons betoken a separation.
Pomegranates predict happy wedlock to those who are single, and
reconciliation to those who are married and have disagreed.
Quinces prognosticate pleasant company.
Roses denote happy love, not unmixed with sorrow from other sources.
Sorrel. To dream of this herb is a sign that you will shortly have occasion
to exert all your prudence to overcome some great calamity.
Sunflowers shew that your pride will be deeply wounded.
Violets predict evil to the single, and joy to the married.
Yellow-flowers of any kind predict jealousy.
Yew-berries predict loss of character to both sexes.

It should be observed that the rules for the interpretation of
dreams are far from being universal. The cheeks of the peasant
girl of England glow with pleasure in the morning after she has
dreamed of a rose, while the paysanne of Normandy dreads
disappointment and vexation for the very same reason. The Switzer
who dreams of an oak-tree does not share in the Englishman's joy;
for he imagines that the vision was a warning to him that, from
some trifling cause, an overwhelming calamity will burst over him.
Thus do the ignorant and the credulous torment themselves; thus do
they spread their nets to catch vexation, and pass their lives
between hopes which are of no value and fears which are a positive
evil.

OMENS. Among the other means of self-annoyance upon which men have
stumbled, in their vain hope of discovering the future, signs and
omens hold a conspicuous place. There is scarcely an occurrence in
nature which, happening at a certain time, is not looked upon by
some persons as a prognosticator either of good or evil. The
latter are in the greatest number, so much more ingenious are we
in tormenting ourselves than in discovering reasons for enjoyment
in the things that surround us. We go out of our course to make
ourselves uncomfortable; the cup of life is not bitter enough to
our palate, and we distil superfluous poison to put into it, or
conjure up hideous things to frighten ourselves at, which would
never exist if we did not make them. "We suffer," says Addison,52*
"as much from trifling accidents as from real evils. I have known
the shooting of a star spoil a night's rest, and have seen a man
in love grow pale and lose his appetite upon the plucking of a
merrythought. A screech-owl at midnight has alarmed a family more
than a band of robbers; nay, the voice of a cricket has struck
more terror than the roaring of a lion. There is nothing so
inconsiderable which may not appear dreadful to an imagination
that is filled with omens and prognostics. A rusty nail or a
crooked pin shoot up into prodigies."

The century and a quarter that has passed away since Addison wrote
has seen the fall of many errors. Many fallacies and delusions
have been crushed under the foot of Time since then; but this has
been left unscathed, to frighten the weak-minded and embitter
their existence. A belief in omens is not confined to the humble
and uninformed. A general, who led an army with credit has been
known to feel alarmed at a winding-sheet in the candle; and
learned men, who had honourably and fairly earned the highest
honours of literature, have been seen to gather their little ones
around them, and fear that one would be snatched away, because,

"When stole upon the time the dead of night,
And heavy sleep had closed up mortal eyes,"

a dog in the street was howling at the moon. Persons who would
acknowledge freely that the belief in omens was unworthy of a man
of sense, have yet confessed at the same time that, in spite of
their reason, they have been unable to conquer their fears of
death when they heard the harmless insect called the death-watch
ticking in the wall, or saw an oblong hollow coal fly out of the
fire.

Many other evil omens besides those mentioned above alarm the
vulgar and the weak. If a sudden shivering comes over such people,
they believe that, at that instant, an enemy is treading over the
spot that will one day be their grave. If they meet a sow when
they first walk abroad in the morning, it is an omen of evil for
that day. To meet an ass, is in like manner unlucky. It is also
very unfortunate to walk under a ladder; to forget to eat goose on
the festival of St. Michael; to tread upon a beetle, or to eat the
twin nuts that are sometimes found in one shell. Woe, in like
manner, is predicted to that wight who inadvertently upsets the
salt; each grain that is overthrown will bring to him a day of
sorrow. If thirteen persons sit at table, one of them will die
within the year; and all of them will be unhappy. Of all evil
omens, this is the worst. The facetious Dr. Kitchener used to
observe that there was one case in which he believed that it was
really unlucky for thirteen persons to sit down to dinner, and
that was when there was only dinner enough for twelve.
Unfortunately for their peace of mind, the great majority of
people do not take this wise view of the matter. In almost every
country of Europe the same superstition prevails, and some carry
it so far as to look upon the number thirteen as in every way
ominous of evil; and if they find thirteen coins in their purse,
cast away the odd one like a polluted thing. The philosophic
Beranger, in his exquisite song, Thirteen at Table, has taken a
poetical view of this humiliating superstition, and mingled, as is
his wont, a lesson of genuine wisdom in his lay. Being at dinner,
he overthrows the salt, and, looking round the room, discovers
that he is the thirteenth guest. While he is mourning his unhappy
fate, and conjuring up visions of disease and suffering and the
grave, he is suddenly startled by the apparition of Death herself,
not in the shape of a grim foe, with skeleton-ribs and menacing
dart, but of an angel of light, who shews the folly of tormenting
ourselves with the dread of her approach, when she is the friend,
rather than the enemy, of man, and frees us from the fetters which
bind us to the dust.

If men could bring themselves to look upon death in this manner,
living well and wisely till her inevitable approach, how vast a
store of grief and vexation would they spare themselves!

Among good omens, one of the most conspicuous is to meet a piebald
horse. To meet two of these animals is still more fortunate; and
if on such an occasion you spit thrice, and form any reasonable
wish, it will be gratified within three days. It is also a sign of
good fortune if you inadvertently put on your stocking wrong side
out. If you wilfully wear your stocking in this fashion, no good
will come of it. It is very lucky to sneeze twice; but if you
sneeze a third time, the omen loses its power, and your good
fortune will be nipped in the bud. If a strange dog follow you,
and fawn on you, and wish to attach itself to you, it is a sign of
very great prosperity. Just as fortunate is it if a strange male
cat comes to your house and manifests friendly intentions towards
your family. If a she cat, it is an omen, on the contrary, of very
great misfortune. If a swarm of bees alight in your garden, some
very high honour and great joys await you.

Besides these glimpses of the future, you may know something of
your fate by a diligent attention to every itching that you may
feel in your body. Thus, if the eye or the nose itches, it is a
sign you will be shortly vexed; if the foot itches you will tread
upon strange ground; and if the elbow itches, you will change your
bedfellow. Itching of the right-hand prognosticates that you will
soon have a sum of money; and, of the left, that you will be
called upon to disburse it.

These are but a few of the omens which are generally credited in
modern Europe. A complete list of them would fatigue from its
length, and sicken from its absurdity. It would be still more
unprofitable to attempt to specify the various delusions of the
same kind which are believed among oriental nations. Every reader
will remember the comprehensive formula of cursing preserved in
Tristram Shandy—curse a man after any fashion you remember or can
invent, you will be sure to find it there. The oriental creed of
omens is not less comprehensive. Every movement of the body, every
emotion of the mind, is at certain times an omen. Every form and
object in nature, even the shape of the clouds and the changes of
the weather; every colour, every sound, whether of men or animals,
or birds or insects, or inanimate things, is an omen. Nothing is
too trifling or inconsiderable to inspire a hope which is not
worth cherishing, or a fear which is sufficient to embitter
existence.

From the belief in omens springs the superstition that has, from
very early ages, set apart certain days, as more favourable than
others, for prying into the secrets of futurity. The following,
copied verbatim from the popular Dream and Omen Book of Mother
Bridget, will shew the belief of the people of England at the
present day. Those who are curious as to the ancient history of
these observances, will find abundant aliment in the Every-day
Book.

"The 1st of January.—If a young maiden drink, on going to bed, a
pint of cold spring-water, in which is beat up an amulet, composed
of the yolk of a pullet's egg, the legs of a spider, and the skin
of an eel pounded, her future destiny will be revealed to her in a
dream. This charm fails of its effect if tried any other day of
the year.

"Valentine Day.—Let a single woman go out of her own door very
early in the morning, and if the first person she meets be a
woman, she will not be married that year; if she meet a man, she
will be married within three months.

"Lady Day.—The following charm may be tried this day with certain
success: String thirty-one nuts on a string, composed of red
worsted mixed with blue silk, and tie it round your neck on going
to bed, repeating these lines:

"Oh, I wish ! oh, I wish to see
Who my true love is to be!

Shortly after midnight, you will see your lover in a dream, and be
informed at the same time of all the principal events of your
future life.

"St. Swithin's Eve.—Select three things you most wish to know;
write them down with a new pen and red ink on a sheet of fine wove
paper, from which you must previously cut off all the corners and
burn them. Fold the paper into a true lover's knot, and wrap round
it three hairs from your head. Place the paper under your pillow
for three successive nights, and your curiosity to know the future
will be satisfied.

"St. Mark's Eve.—Repair to the nearest churchyard as the clock
strikes twelve, and take from a grave on the south side of the
church three tufts of grass (the longer and ranker the better),
and on going to bed place them under your pillow, repeating
earnestly three several times,

'The Eve of St. Mark by prediction is blest,
Set therefore my hopes and my fears all to rest:
Let me know my fate, whether weal or woe;
Whether my rank's to be high or low;
Whether to live single, or be a bride,
And the destiny my star doth provide.'
Should you have no dream that night, you will be single and
miserable all your life. If you dream of thunder and lightning,
your life will be one of great difficulty and sorrow.

"Candlemas Eve.—On this night (which is the purification of the
Virgin Mary), let three, five, seven, or nine, young maidens
assemble together in a square chamber. Hang in each corner a
bundle of sweet herbs, mixed with rue and rosemary. Then mix a
cake of flour, olive-oil, and white sugar; every maiden having an
equal share in the making and the expense of it. Afterwards, it
must be cut into equal pieces, each one marking the piece as she
cuts it with the initials of her name. It is then to be baked one
hour before the fire, not a word being spoken the whole time, and
the maidens sitting with their arms and knees across. Each piece
of cake is then to be wrapped up in a sheet of paper, on which
each maiden shall write the love part of Solomon's Songs. If she
put this under her pillow she will dream true. She will see her
future husband and every one of her children, and will know
besides whether her family will be poor or prosperous, a comfort
to her or the contrary.

"Midsummer.—Take three roses, smoke them with sulphur, and exactly
at three in the day bury one of the roses under a yew tree; the
second in a newly-made grave, and put the third under your pillow
for three nights, and at the end of that period burn it in a fire
of charcoal. Your dreams during that time will be prophetic of
your future destiny, and, what is still more curious and valuable,
says Mother Bridget, the man whom you are to wed will enjoy no
peace till he comes and visits you. Besides this, you will
perpetually haunt his dreams.

"St. John's Eve.—Make a new pincushion of the very best black
velvet (no inferior quality will answer the purpose), and on one
side stick your name in full length with the very smallest pins
that can be bought (none other will do). On the other side, make a
cross with some very large pins, and surround it with a circle.
Put this into your stocking when you take it off at night, and
hang it up at the foot of the bed. All your future life will pass
before you in a dream.

"First New Moon of the year.—On the first new moon in the year,
take a pint of clear spring water and infuse into it the white of
an egg laid by a white hen, a glass of white wine, three almonds
peeled white, and a tablespoonful of white rose-water. Drink this
on going to bed, not making more nor less than three draughts of
it; repeating the following verses three several times in a clear
distinct voice, but not so loud as to be overheard by any body:

'If I dream of water pure
    Before the coming morn,
'Tis a sign I shall be poor,
    And unto wealth not born.
If I dream of tasting beer,
Middling then will be my cheer—
Chequer'd with the good and bad,
Sometimes joyful, sometimes sad;
But should I dream of drinking wine,
Wealth and pleasure will be mine.
The stronger the drink, the better the cheer—
Dreams of my destiny, appear, appear!'

"Twenty-ninth of February.—This day, as it only occurs once in
four years, is peculiarly auspicious to those who desire to have a
glance at futurity, especially to young maidens burning with
anxiety to know the appearance and complexion of their future
lords. The charm to be adopted is the following: Stick
twenty-seven of the smallest pins that are made, three by three,
into a tallow candle. Light it up at the wrong end, and then place
it in a candlestick made out of clay, which must be drawn from a
virgin's grave. Place this on the chimney-place, in the left-hand
corner, exactly as the clock strikes twelve, and go to bed
immediately. When the candle is burnt out, take the pins and put
them into your left shoe; and before nine nights have elapsed your
fate will be revealed to you."

We have now taken a hasty review of the various modes of seeking
to discover the future, especially as practised in modern times.
The main features of the folly appear essentially the same in all
countries. National character and peculiarities operate some
difference of interpretation. The mountaineer makes the natural
phenomena which he most frequently witnesses prognosticative of
the future. The dweller in the plains, in a similar manner, seeks
to know his fate among the signs of the things that surround him,
and tints his superstition with the hues of his own clime. The
same spirit animates them all—the same desire to know that which
Infinite Mercy has concealed. There is but little probability that
the curiosity of mankind in this respect will ever be wholly
eradicated. Death and ill fortune are continual bugbears to the
weak-minded, the irreligious, and the ignorant; and while such
exist in the world, divines will preach upon its impiety and
philosophers discourse upon its absurdity in vain. Still, it is
evident that these follies have greatly diminished. Soothsayers
and prophets have lost the credit they formerly enjoyed, and skulk
in secret now where they once shewed their faces in the blaze of
day. So far there is manifest improvement.