Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	blood_n	body_n	spirit_n	1,496	5	4.9543	4	false

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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A42832	Some philosophical considerations touching the being of witches and witchcraft written in a letter to the much honour'd Robert Hunt, Esq. / by J.G., a member of the Royal Society.	Glanvill, Joseph, 1636-1680.; Hunt, Robert, Esq.	1667 (1667)	Wing G832; ESTC R16266	27,107	66

whereby they become mischievously influential and the word venefica intimates some such matter Now that the imagination hath a mighty power in operation is seen in the just now mention'd Signatures and Diseases that it causeth and that the fancy is modified by the qualities of th bloud and spirits is too evident to need proof which things supposed 't is plain to conceive that the evil spirit having breath'd some vile vapour into the body of the Witch it may taint her bloud and spirits with a noxious quality by which her infected imagination heightned by melancholy and this worse cause may do much hurt upon bodies that are impressive by such influences And 't is very likely that this ferment disposeth the imagination of the Sorceress to cause the mentioned 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or separation of the soul from the body and may perhaps keep the body in fit temper for its re-entry as also it may facilitate transformation which it may be could not be effected by ordinary and unassisted imagination Thus we see 't is not so desperate to form an apprehension of the manner of these odde performances and though they are not done the way I have describ'd yet what I have said may help us to a conceit of the possibility which sufficeth for my purpose And though the Hypothesis I have gone upon will seem as unlikely to some as the things they attempt to explain are to others yet I must desire their leave to suggest that most things seem unlikely especially to the conceited and opinionative at first proposal and many great truths are strange and improbable till custom and acquaintance have reconciled them to our fancies And I 'le presume to adde on this occasion though I love not to be confident in affirming that there is none of the Platonical supposals I have used but what I could make appear to be fair and reasonable to the capable and unprejudic'd But I come 3 to another prejudice against the being of Witches which is That 't is very improbable that the Devil who is a wise and mighty spirit should be at the beck of a poor Hag and have so little to do as to attend the errands of the impotent lusts of a silly old woman To which I might answer 1 That 't is much more improbable that all the world should be deceiv'd in matters of fact and circumstances of the clearest evidence and conviction than that the Devil who is wicked should be also unwise and that he that persuades all his subjects and accomplices out of their wits should himself act like his own temptations and persuasions In brief there is nothing more strange in this objection than that wickedness is baseness and servility and that the Devil is at leisure to serve those he is at leisure to tempt and industrious to ruin And again 2 I see no necessity to believe that the Devil is always the Witch's confederate but perhaps it may fitly be consider'd whether the Familiar be not some departed humane spirit forsaken of God and goodness and swallowed up by the unsatiable desire of mischief and revenge which possibly by the laws and capacity of its state it cannot execute immediately And why we should presume that the Devil should have the liberty of wandering up and down the Earth and Air when he is said to be held in the chains of darkness and yet that the separated souls of the wicked of whom no such thing is affirm'd in any Sacred Record should be thought so imprison'd that they cannot possibly wag from the place of their confinement I know no shadow of conjecture This conceit I 'm confident hath prejudic'd many against the belief of Witches and Apparitions they not being able to conceive that the Devil should be so ludricous as appearing spirits are sometimes reported to be in their frolicks and they presume that souls departed never re-visit the free and open Regions which confidence I know nothing to justifie For since good men in their state of separation are said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 why the wicked may not be supposed to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the worst sense of the word I know nothing to help me to imagine And if it be supposed that the Imps of Witches are sometimes wicked spirits of our own kind and nature and possibly the same that have been Sorcerers and Witches in this life This supposal may give a fairer and more probable account of many of the actions of Sorcery and Witchcraft than the other Hypothesis that they are always Devils And to this conjecture I 'l adventure to subjoyn another which also hath its probability viz. 3 That 't is not impossible but that the Familiars of Witches are a servile kind of spirits of a very inferiour constitution and nature and none of those that were once of the highest Hierarchy now degenerated into the spirits we call Devils And for my part I must confess that I think the common division of spirits much too general conceiving it likely there may be as great a variety of Intellectual creatures in the invisible world as there is of Animals in the visible and that all the superiour yea and inferiour Regions have their several kinds of spirits differing in their natural perfections as well as in the kinds and degrees of their depravities which being supposed 't is very probable that those of the basest and meanest Orders are they who submit to the mention'd servilities And thus the sagess and grandeur of the Prince of darkness need not be brought into question But 4 the opinion of Witches seems to some to accuse Providence and to suggest that it hath exposed Innocents to the fury and malice of revengeful Fiends yea and supposeth those most obnoxious for whom we might most reasonably expect a more special tutelary care and protection most of the cruel practices of those presum'd Instruments of Hell being upon Children who as they least deserve to be deserted by that Providence that superintends all things so they most need its guardian influence To this so specious an Objection I have these things to answer 1 Providence is a Deep unfathomable and if we should not believe the Phoenomena of our senses before we can reconcile them to our notions of Providence we must be groffer Scepticks than ever yet was extant The miseries of the present life the unequal distributions of good and evil the ignorance and barbarity of the greatest part of mankind the fatal disadvantages we are all under and the hazard we run of being eternally miserable and undone these I say are things that can hardly be made consistent with that Wisdom and Goodness that we are sure hath made and mingled it self with all things And yet we believe there is a beauty and harmony and goodness in that Providence though we cannot unriddle it in particular instances nor by reason of our ignorance and imperfection clear it from contradicting appearances and consequently

directs that Prayer Psal. 71. 9 10. Cast me not off in the time of old age forsake me not when my strength faileth For They that keep my soul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as the LXX and the Vulgar Latin Qui custodiunt animam meam they take counsel together saying God hath forsaken him persecute him and take him for there is none to deliver him But I adde 2 That 't is very probable that the state wherein they are will not easily permit palpable intercourses between the bad Genii and our nature since 't is like enough that their own Laws and Government do not allow their frequent excursions into this world Or it may with as great probability be supposed that 't is a very hard and painful thing for them to force their thin and tenuious bodies into a visible consistence and such shapes as are necessary for their designs in their correspondencies with Witches For in this action their bodies must needs be exceedingly compress'd which cannot be well supposed without a painful sense And this is perhaps a reason why there are so few Apparitions and why appearing spirits are commonly in such haste to be gone viz. that they may be deliver'd from the unnatural pressure of their tender Vehicles which I confess holds more in the apparitions of good than of evil Spirits most Relations of this kind describing their discoveries of themselves as very transient though for those the Holy Scripture records there may be peculiar Reasons why they are not so whereas the wicked ones are not altogether so quick and hasty in their Visits The reason of which probably is the great subtilty and tenuity of the bodies of the former which will require far greater degrees of compression and consequently of pain to make them visible whereas the latter are more foeculent and gross and so nearer allyed to palpable consistencies and more easily reduceable to appearance and visibility At this turn Sir you may perceive that I have again made use of the Platonick Hypothesis That Spirits are Embodyed upon which indeed a great part of my Discourse is grounded And therefore I hold my self obliged to a short account of that supposal It seems then to me very probable from the Nature of Sense and Analogie of Nature For 1. We perceive in our selves that all Sense is caus'd and excited by motion made in matter And when those motions which convey sensible impressions to the Brain the Seat of Sense are intercepted Sense is lost So that if we suppose Spirits perfectly to be disjoyn'd from all matter 't is not conceivable how they can have the sense of any thing For how material Objects should any way be perceiv'd or felt without vital union with matter 't is not possiblè to imagine Nor doth it 2. seem suitable to the Analogie of Nature which useth not to make precipitious leaps from one thing to another but usually proceeds by orderly steps and gradations whereas were there no order of Beings between us who are so deeply plunged into the grossest matter and pure unbodied Spirits 't were a mighty jump in Nature Since then the greatest part of the World consists of the finer portions of matter and our own Souls are immediately united unto these 't is infinitely probable to conjecture that the nearer orders of Spirits are vitally joyn'd to such Bodies And so Nature by Degrees ascending still by the more refin'd and subtile matter gets at last to the pure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or immaterial minds which the Platonists made the highest Order of created Beings But of this I have discoursed else-where and have said thus much of it at present because it will enable me to add another Reason of the unfrequency of Apparitions and Compacts viz. 3. Because 't is very likely that these Regions are very unsuitable and disproportion'd to the frame and temper of their Senses and Bodies so that perhaps the Courser Spirits can no more bear the Air of our World then Batts and Owls can the brightest beams of Day Nor can the Purer and Better any more endure the noysom steams and poysonous reeks of this Dunghil Earth then the Delicate can bear a confinement in nasty Dungeons and the foul squallid Caverns of uncomfortable Darkness So that 't is no more wonder that the better Spirits no oftner appear than that men are not more frequently in the Dark Hollows under ground Nor is 't any more strange that evil Spirits so rarely visit us then that Fishes do not ordinarily fly in the Air as 't is said one sort of them doth or that we see not the Batt daily fluttering in the beams of the Sun And now by the help of what I have spoken under this Head I am provided with some things wherewith to disable another Objection which I thus propose XI If there be such an intercourse between Evil Spirits and the Wicked how comes it about that there is no correspondence between Good Spirits and the Vertuous since without doubt these are as desirous to propagate the Spirit and Designes of the upper and better World as those are to promote the Interest of the Kingdom of Darkness Which way of arguing is still from our Ignorance of the State and Government of the other World which must be confest and may without prejudice to the Proposition I defend But particularly I say 1. That we have ground enough to believe that Good Spirits do interpose in yea and govern our Affairs For that there is a Providence reaching from Heaven to Earth is generally acknowledg'd but that this supposeth all things to be order'd by the immediate influence and interposal of the Supreme Deity is not very Philosophical to suppose since if we judge by the Analogie of the Natural World all things we see are carried on by the Ministry of Second Causes and intermediate Agents And it doth not seem so Magnificent and Becoming an apprehension of the Supreme Numen to phancy His immediate Hand in every trivial Management But 't is exceeding likely to conjecture that much of the Government of us and our Affairs is committed to the better Spirits with a due subordination and subserviency to the Will of the chief Rector of the Universe And 't is not absurd to believe that there is a Government runs from Highest to Lowest the better and more perfect orders of Being still ruling the inferiour and less perfect So that some one would phancy that perhaps the Angels may manage us as we do the Creatures that God and Nature have placed under our Empire and Dominion But however that is That God rules the lower World by the Ministry of Angels is very consonant to the sacred Oracles Thus Deut. XXXII viii ix When the Most High divided the Nations their inheritance when he separated the sons of Adam he set the bounds of the people 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the number of the Angels of God as the Septuagint renders it the Authority of which