for, we think, deep down in the nature of man, which is much the same to-day in its relation to the supernatural world as it was in the days of our fathers of bigoted memory. In reality, the supernatural element exists to a greater or less degree in all of us, and no merely human agency can pretend to fix its limits.

Unquestionably, then, those beliefs which have exerted so potent an influence in the past over the minds or affairs of men, which continue to exert such influence to-day, and, for ought we know to the contrary, may extend that influence indefinitely, are not to be whistled down the wind, or kept hidden away under lock and key, especially when we reflect that the most terrible examples of the frailty of all human judgments concerning these beliefs have utterly failed to remove the groundwork upon which they rest.

There still remains the sentimental side of superstition to consider. What, for example, would become of much of our best literature, if all those apt and beautiful figures culled from the rich stores of ancient mythology—the very flowers of history, so to speak—were to be weeded out of it with unsparing hand? What would Greek and Roman history be with their gods and goddesses left out? With what loving and appreciative art our greatest poets have gathered up the scattered legends of the fading past. Some one has cunningly said that superstition is the poetry of life, and that of all men poets should be superstitious.

As a matter of history, it is well known that our Puritan ancestors came over here filled full of the prevalent superstitions of the old country; yet even they had waged uncompromising warfare against all such ceremonious observances as could be traced back to heathen mythology. Thus, although they cut down May-poles, they had too much reverence for the Bible to refuse to believe in witches. Writers like Mr. Hawthorne have supposed that the wild and extravagant mysteries of their savage neighbors, may, to some extent, have become incorporated with their own beliefs. However that may be, it is certain that the Puritan fathers believed in no end of pregnant omens, also in ghosts, apparitions, and witches, as well as in a personal devil, with whom, indeed, later on, they had no end of trouble. In short, if anything happened out of the common, the devil was in it. So say many to-day.

A certain amount of odium has attached itself to the Puritan fathers of New England, on this account, among unreflecting or ill-natured critics at least, just as if, upon leaving Old England, those people would be expected to leave their superstitions behind them, like so much useless luggage. As a matter of fact, rank superstition was the common inheritance of all peoples of that day and generation, whether Jew or Gentile, Frenchman or Dutchman, Virginian or New Englander. Of its wide prevalence in Old England we find ample proof ready to our hand. For example:

“At Boston, in Lincolnshire, Mr. Cotton being their former minister, when he was gone the bishop desired to have organs set up in the church, but the parish was unwilling to yield; but, however, the bishop prevailed to be at the cost to set them up. But they being newly up (not playing very often with them) a violent storm came in at one window and blew the organs to another window, and brake both organs and window down, and to this day the window is out of reputation, being boarded and not glazed.”2

Still further to show the feeling prevailing in England toward superstition at the time of the settlement of this country, in the historical essay entitled “With the King at Oxford,” we find this anecdote: The King (Charles I.), coming into the Bodleian Library on a certain day, was shown a very curious copy of Virgil. Lord Falkland persuaded his Majesty to make trial of his fortune by thrusting a knife between the leaves, then opening the book at the place in which the knife was inserted. The king there read as follows:—

The narrative goes on to say that the king’s majesty was “much discomposed” by this uncanny incident, and that Lord Falkland, in order to turn the king’s thoughts away from brooding over it, proposed making the trial himself.

We continue to draw irrefragable testimony to the truth of our position from the highest personages in the realm. Again, according to Wallington, Archbishop Laud, arch persecutor of the Puritans, has this passage in his diary: “That on such or such a day of the month he was made archbishop of Canterbury, and on that day, which was a great day of honor to him, his coach and horses sunk as they came over the ferry at Lambeth, in the ferry-boat, and he prayed that this might be no ill omen.”

Our pious ancestors put a good deal of faith in so-called “judgments,” or direct manifestations of the divine wrath toward evildoers, as all readers of Mather’s “Remarkable Providences” well know. But they were by no means alone in such beliefs. It is related of the poet Milton, after he became blind, that the Duke of York (later James II.) asked him if he did not consider the loss of his eyesight as a judgment inflicted upon him for what he had written of the late king. In reply Milton asked the duke, if such afflictions were to be regarded as judgments from heaven, in what manner he would account for the fate of the late king; ... he, the speaker, had only lost his eye, while the king had lost his head.”

John Josselyn, Gent., an Englishman, but no Puritan, who spent some time in New England, chiefly at Scarborough in Maine, published, in 1672, in England, a little book under the title of “New England’s Rarities Discovered.” Some things which Josselyn “discovered” would be rarities indeed to this generation. For instance, he describes the appearance of several prodigious apparitions—all of which has a value in enabling us properly to gauge the tone and temper of popular feeling where the book was written, and where it was published. One of his “rarities” is worth repeating here, if only for the pretty sentiment it embodies. He says of the twittering chimney-swallows, “that when about to migrate they commonly throw down (the chimney) one of their young into the room below, by way of gratitude,” presumably in return for the hospitalities of the house. He then goes on to say, “I have more than once observed that, against the ruin of a family, these birds will forsake the house and come no more.” This comes from a more or less close observer, who himself occupied the relation we desire to establish, namely that of a transplanted Englishman, so thoroughly grounded in old superstition that all the marvels he relates are told with an air of truth quite refreshing.

An amusing instance of how far prevalent superstition can lead astray minds usually enlightened is soberly set forth in Governor Winthrop’s celebrated history. It is a fit corollary to the organ superstition, just narrated.

“Mr. Winthrop the younger, one of the magistrates, having