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

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A70179	A blow at modern Sadducism in some philosophical considerations about witchcraft. To which is added, the relation of the fam'd disturbance by the drummer, in the house of Mr. John Mompesson, with some reflections on drollery and atheisme. / By a member of the Royal Society..	Glanvill, Joseph, 1636-1680.	1668 (1668)	Wing G799; Wing G818; ESTC R23395	62,297	178

the action by the evidence and not the evidence by the measures of our fancies about the action This is proudly to exalt our own opinions above the clearest testimonies and most sensible demonstrations of fact and so to give the Lye to all Mankind rather than distrust the little conceits of our bold imaginations But yet further 3 I THINK there is nothing in the instances mention'd but what may as well be accounted for by the Rules of Reason and Philosophy as the ordinary affairs of Nature For in resolving natural Phoenomena we can only assign the probable causes shewing how things may be not presuming how they are And in the particulars under our Examen we may give an account how 't is possible and not unlikely that such things though somewhat varying from the common rode of Nature may be acted And if our narrow and contracted mindes can furnish us with apprehensions of the way and manner of such performances though perhaps not the true ones 't is an argument that such things may be effected by creatures whose powers and knowledge are so vastly exceeding ours I shall endeavour therefore briefly to suggest some things that may render the possibility of these performances conceivable in order to the removal of this Objection that they are contradictions and impossible FOR the First then That the confederate Spirit should transport the Witch through the Air to the place of general Rendezvous there is no difficulty in conceiving it and if that be true which great Philosophers affirm concerning the real separability of the Soul from the Body without death there is yet less for then 't is easie to apprehend that the Soul having left its gross and sluggish Body behinde it and being cloath'd only with its immediate vehicle of Air or more subtile matter may be quickly conducted to any place it would be at by those officious Spirits that attend it And though I adventure to affirm nothing concerning the truth and certainty of this supposition yet I must needs say it doth not seem to me unreasonable And our experience of Apoplexies Epilepsies Extastes and the strange things men report to have seen during those deliquiums look favourably upon this conjecture which seems to me to contradict no principle of Reason or Philosophy since Death consists not so much in the actual separation of Soul and Body as in the indisposition and unfitness of the Body for vital union as an excellent Philosopher hath made good On which Hypothesis the Witches anointing her self before she takes her flight may perhaps serve to keep the Body tenantable and in fit disposition to receive the Spirit at its return These things I say we may conceive though I affirm nothing about them and there is nothing in such conceptions but what hath been own'd by men of worth and name and may seem fair and accountable enough to those who judge not altogether by the measures of the populace and customary opinion And there 's a saying of a great Apostle that seems to countenance this Platonick opinion what is the meaning else of that expression Whether in the body or out of the body I cannot tell except the Soul may be separated from the body without death which if it be granted possible 't is sufficient for my purpose And 2. The Transformations of Witches into the shapes of other Animals upon the same supposal is very conceivable since then 't is easie enough to imagine that the power of imagination may form those passive and pliable vehicles into those shapes with more ease than the fancy of the Mother can the stubborn matter of the Foetus in the womb as we see it frequently doth in the instances that occur of Signatures and monstrous Singularities and perhaps sometimes the confederate Spirit puts tricks upon the senses of the spectators and those shapes are only illusions BUT then 3. when they feel the hurts in their gross bodies that they receive in their aiery vehicles they must be supposed to have been really present at least in these latter and 't is no more difficult to apprehend how the hurts of those should be translated upon their other bodies then how diseases should be inflicted by the imagination or how the fancy of the Mother should wound the Foetus as several credible relations do attest AND 4. for their raising storms and tempests they do it not be sure by their own but by the power of the Prince of the Air their friend and allie and the Ceremonies that are enjoyn'd them are doubtless nothing else but entertainments for their imaginations and are likely design'd to perswade them that they do these strange things themselves AND lastly for their being suck'd by the Familiar I say 1 we know so little of the nature of Doemons and Spirits that 't is no wonder we cannot certainly divine the reason of so strange an action And yet 2 we may conjecture at some things that may render it less improbable For some have thought that the Genii whom both the Platonical and Christian Antiquity thought embodied are recreated by the reeks and vapours of humane blood and the spirits that derive from them Which supposal if we grant them bodies is not unlikely every thing being refresh'd and nourish'd by its like And that they are not perfectly abstract from all body and matter besides the reverence we owe to the wisest antiquity there are several considerable arguments I could alledge to render it exceeding probable Which things supposed the Devil 's sucking the Sorceress is no great wonder nor difficult to be accounted for Or perhaps 3 this may be only a diabolical Sacrament and Ceremony to confirm the hellish covenant To which I added 4 That which to me seems most probable viz That the Familiar doth not only suck the Witch but in the action infuseth some poisonous ferment into her which gives her imagination and spirits a magical tincture 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 the blood 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 blood and spirits with a noxious quality by which her infected imagination heightned by melancholly and this worse cause may do much hurt upon bodies that are impressible 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

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 kinde describing their discoveries of themselves as very transient though for those the Holy Scripture records there may be peculiar reason 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 embodied 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 Analogy 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 possible to imagine Nor doth it 2. seem suitable to the Analogy 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 elsewhere and have said thus much of it at present because it will enable me to adde 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 than Bats 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 than 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 than 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 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 Designs 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 Analogy 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 fancy 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 fancy 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 Translation is abundantly credited and asserted by its being quoted in the New Testament without notice of the H●brew Text even there where it differs from it as learned men have observ'd We know also that Angels were very familiar with the Patriarchs of old and Jacob's Ladder is a Mystery which imports their ministring in the affairs of the Lower World Thus Origen and others understand that to be spoken by the Presidential Angels Jer LI. ix We would have healed BABYLON but she is not healed forsake her and let us go Like the Voice heard in the Temple before the taking of Jerusalem by Titus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And before Nebuchadnezzar was sent to learn Wisdom and Religion among the Beasts He sees a Watcher according to the 70. an Angel and an holy One come down from heaven Dan. IV. xiii who pronounceth the sad Decree against Him and calls it the Decree of the Watchers who very probably were the Guardian Genii of Himself and his Kingdom And that there are particular Angels that

cast out Devils by Beelzebub in his return to which he denies not the supposition or possibility of the thing in general but clears himself by an appeal to the actions of their own children whom they would not task so severely And I cannot very well understand why those times should be priviledg'd from VVITCHCRAFT and Diabolical compacts more than they were from Possessions which we know were then more frequent for ought appears to the contrary than ever they were before or since But besides this There are intimations plain enough in the Apostles Writings of the being of Sorcery and VVITCHCRAFT St. Paul reckons Witchcraft next Idolatry in his Catalogue of the work● of the flesh Gal. V. xx and the Sorcerers are again joyn'd with Idolaters in that sad Denunciation Rev. XXI viii and a little after Rev. XXII xv They are reckon'd again among Idolaters Murderers and those others that are without And methinks the story of Simon Magus and his Diabolical Oppositions of the Gospel in its beginnings should afford clear conviction To all which I adde this more general consideration 3. That though the New Testament had mention'd nothing of this matter yet its silence in such cases is not argumentative Our Saviour spake as he had occasion and the thousandth part of what he did and said is not recorded as one of his Historians intimates He said nothing of those large unknown Tracts of America nor gave he any intimations of as much as the ●●●●…nce of that numerous people much 〈◊〉 did he leave instructions about their conversion He gives no account of the aff●●●s and state of the other world but only 〈◊〉 general one of the happiness of some and the misery of others He made no discovery of the magnalia of Art or Nature no not of those whereby the propagation of the Gospel might have been much advanced viz. the Mystery of Printing and the Magnet and yet no one useth his silence in these instances as an argument against the being of things which are evident objects of sense I confess the omission of some of these particulars is pretty strange and unaccountable and concludes our ignorance of the reasons and menages of Providence but I suppose nothing else Thus Sir to the FIRST But the other pretence also must be examined 2 Miracles are ceast therefore the presumed actions of Witchcraft are tales and illusions To make a due return to this we must consider a great and difficult Problem which is what is a real Miracle And for answer to this weighty Question I think 1. That it is not the strangeness or unaccountableness of the thing done simply from whence we are to conclude a Miracle For then we are so to account of all the Magnalia of Nature and all the mysteries of those honest Arts which we do not understand Nor 2 is this the Criterion of a Miracle that 't is concluded beyond all natural powers for we are ignorant of the extent and bounds of Natures sphere and possibilities And if this were the character and essential mark of a Miracle we could not know what was so except we could determine the extent of natural causalities and fix their bounds and be able to say to Nature Hitherto canst Thou go and no further And he that makes this his measure whereby to judge a Miracle is himself the greatest Miracle of knowledge or immodesty Besides though an effect may transcend really all the powers of meer nature yet there is a world of spirits that must be taken into our account And as to them also I say 3 Every thing is not a Miracle that is done by Agents supernatural There is no doubt but that Evil spirits can make wonderful combinations of natural causes and perhaps perform many things immediately which are prodigious and beyond the longest line of Nature But yet These are not therefore to be called Miracles for They are SACRED WONDERS and suppose the POWER to be DIVINE But how shall the power be known to be so when we so little understand the capacities and extent of the abilities of lower Agents The Answer to this Question will discover the Criterion of Miracles which must be supposed to have all the former particulars They are unaccountable beyond the powers of meer nature and done by Agents supernatural and to these must be superadded 4. That they have peculiar circumstances that speak them of a Divine original Their mediate Authors declare them to be so and they are alwayes persons of Simplicity Truth and Holiness void of Ambition and all secular Designs They seldom use Ceremonies or natural Applications and yet surmount all the activities of known nature They work those wonders not to raise admiration or out of the vanity to be talk't of but to seal and confirm some divine Doctrine or Commission in which the good and happiness of the world is concern'd I say by such circumstances as these wonderful actions are known to be from a Divine cause and that makes and distinguisheth a Miracle And thus I am prepared for an answer to the Objection to which I make this brief return That though WITCHES by their Confederate Spirit do those odde and astonishing things we believe of them yet are they no Miracles there being evidence enough from the badness of their lives and the ridiculous ceremonies of their performances from their malice and mischievous designs that the POWER that works and the end for which those things are done is not Divine but Diabolical And by singular providence they are not ordinarily permitted as much as to pretend to any new sacred Discoveries in matters of Religion or to act any thing for confirmation of Doctrinal Impostures So that whether Miracles are ceased or not these are none And that such Miracles as are only strange and unaccountable performances above the common methods of art or nature are not ceas'd we have a late great evidence in the famous GREATRAK concerning whom it will not be impertinent to adde the following account which I had in a Letter from the Reverend Dr. R. Dean of C. a person of great veracity and a Philosopher This learned Gentleman then is pleased thus to write The great discourse now at the Coffee-Houses and every where is about Mr. G. the famous Irish Stroker concerning whom it is like you expect an account from me He undergoes various censures here some take him to be a Conjurer and some an Impostor but others again adore him as an Apostle I confess I think the man is free from all design of a very agreeable conversation not addicted to any Vice nor to any Sect or Party but is I believe a sincere Protestant I was three weeks together with him at my Lord Conwayes and saw him I think lay his hands upon a thousand persons and really there is some thing in it more then ordinary but I am convinc'd it is not miraculous I have seen pains strangely fly before his hand till he hath chased