was above his; but that, as to himself, his god's con tinued kindness obliged him not to forsake his service." It appears, from the above and similar passages, that Dr. Cotton Mather, an honest and devout but sufficiently credulous man, had mistaken the purpose of the tolerant powah. The latter only desired to elude the necessity of his practices being brought under the observant eye of an European, while he found an ingenious apology in the admitted superiority which he naturally conceded to the Deity of a people, advanced, as he might well conceive, so far above his own in power and attainments, as might reasonably infer a corresponding superiority in the nature and objects of their worship.

From another narrative, we are entitled to infer that the European wizard was held superior to the native sorcerer of North America. Among the numberless extravagances of the Scottish Dissenters of the 17th century, now canonized in a lump by those who view them in the general light of enemies to prelacy, was a certain ship-master, called, from his size, Meikle John Gibb. This man, a person called Jamie, and one or two other men, besides twenty or thirty females who adhered to them, went the wildest lengths of enthusiasm. Gibb headed a party, who followed him into the moorlands, and at the Ford Moss, between Airth and Stirling, burned their Bibles, as an act of solemn adherence to their new faith. They were apprehended in consequence, and committed to prison; and the rest of the Dissenters, however differently they were affected by the persecution of government, when it applied to themselves, were nevertheless much offended that these poor mad people were not brought to capital punishment for their blasphemous extravagances; and imputed it as a fresh crime to the Duke of York, that, though he could not be often accused of toleration, he considered the discipline of the house of correction as more likely to bring the unfortunate Gibbites to their senses, than

the more dignified severities of a public trial and the gallows. The Cameronians, however, did their best to correct this scandalous lenity. As Meikle John Gibb, who was their comrade in captivity, used to dis turb their worship in jail by his maniac howling, two of them took turn about to hold him down by force, and silence him by a napkin thrust into his mouth. This mode of quieting the unlucky heretic, though sufficiently emphatic, being deemed ineffectual or inconvenient, George Jackson, a Cameronian, who afterward suffered at the gallows, dashed the maniac with his feet and hands against the wall, and beat him so severely, that the rest were afraid that he had killed him outright. After which specimen of fraternal chastisement, the lunatic, to avoid the repetition of the discipline, whenever the prisoners began worship, ran behind the door, and there, with his own napkin crammed into his mouth, sat howling like a chastised cur. But on being finally transported to America, John Gibb, we are assured, was much admired by the heathen for his familiar converse with the Devil bodily, and offering sacrifices to him. "He died there," says Walker, "about the year 1720."* We must necessarily infer, that the pretensions of the natives to supernatural communication could not be of a high class, since we find them honouring this poor madman as their superior: and, in general, that the magic, or powahing, of the North American Indians, was not of a nature to be much apprehended by the British colonists, since the natives themselves gave honour and precedence to those Europeans who came among them with the character of possessing intercourse with the spirits whom they themselves professed to worship.

Notwithstanding this inferiority on the part of the powahs, it occurred to the settlers that the heathen

See Patrick Walker's Biographia Presbyteriana, vol. ii. p. 23; also God's Judgment upon Persecutors, and Wodrow's History, upon the article John Gibb.

Indians and Roman Catholic Frenchmen were particularly favoured by the demons, who sometimes adopted their appearance, and showed themselves in their likeness, to the great annoyance of the colonists. Thus, in the year 1692, a party of real or imaginary French and Indians exhibited themselves occasionally to the colonists of the town of Glou cester, in the county of Essex, New-England, alarmed the country around very greatly, skirmished repeatedly with the English, and caused the raising of two regiments, and the despatching a strong reinforcement to the assistance of the settlement. But as these visitants, by whom they were plagued more than a fortnight, though they exchanged fire with the settlers, never killed or scalped any one, the English became convinced that they were not real Indians and Frenchmen, but that the Devil and his agents had assumed such an appearance, although seemingly not enabled effectually to support it, for the molestation of the colony.*

It appears, then, that the ideas of superstition which the more ignorant converts to the Christian faith borrowed from the wreck of the classic mythology, were so rooted in the minds of their successors, that these found corroboration of their faith in demonology in the practice of every pagan nation whose destiny it was to encounter them as enemies, and that as well within the limits of Europe, as in every other part of the globe to which their arms were carried. In a word, it may be safely laid down, that the commonly received doctrine of demonology, presenting the same general outlines, though varied according to the fancy of particular nations, existed through all Europe. It seems to have been founded originally on feelings incident to the human heart, or diseases to which the human frame is liable, to have been largely augmented by what classic superstitions sur

* Magnalia, book vii. article xviii. The fact is also alleged in the Life of Sir William Phipps.

vived the ruins of paganism,-and to have received new contributions from the opinions collected among the barbarous nations, whether of the east or of the west. It is now necessary to enter more minutely into the question, and endeavour to trace from what especial sources the people of the middle ages derived those notions, which gradually assumed the shape of a regular system of demonology.

LETTER III.

Creed of Zoroaster-Received partially into most Heathen Nations-Instances among the Celtic Tribes of Scotland-Beltaine Feast-Gudeman's Croft-Such Abuses admitted into Christianity after the earlier Ages of the Church-Law of the Romans against Witchcraft-Roman Customs survive the Fall of their Religion-Instances--Demonology of the Northern Barbarians-Nicksas-Bhar-geist-Correspondence 'between the Northern and Roman Witches-The Power of Fascination ascribed to the Sorceresses-Example from the Eyrbiggia Saga-The Prophetesses of the Germans-The Gods of Valhalla not highly regarded by their Worshippers-Often defied by their Champions-Demons of the North--Story of Assueit and Asmund-Action of Ejectment against Spectres--Adventure of a Champion with the Goddess Freya--Conversion of the Pagans of Iceland to Christianity-Northern Superstitions mixed with those of the Celts-Satyrs of the NorthHighland Onrisk-Meming the Satyr.

THE creed of Zoroaster, which naturally occurs to unassisted reason as a mode of accounting for the mingled existence of good and evil in the visible world that belief which, in one modification or another, supposes the coexistence of a benevolent and malevolent principle, which contend together without either being able decisively to prevail over his antagonist, leads the fear and awe deeply impressed on the human mind to the worship as well of the author of evil, so tremendous in all the effects of which credulity accounts him the primary cause, as to that of his great opponent, who is loved and adored as the Father of all that is good and bounti

ful. Nay, such is the timid servility of human nature, that the worshippers will neglect the altars of the Author of good, rather than that of Arimanes, trusting with indifference to the well-known mercy of the one, while they shrink from the idea of irritating the vengeful jealousy of the awful father of evil.

The Celtic tribes, by whom, under various denominations, Europe seems to have been originally peopled, possessed, in common with other savages, a natural tendency to the worship of the evil principle. They did not, perhaps, adore Arimanes, under one sole name, or consider the malignant divinities as sufficiently powerful to undertake a direct struggle with the more benevolent gods; yet they thought it worth while to propitiate them by various expiatory rites and prayers, that they, and the elementary tempests, which they conceived to be under their direct command, might be merciful to suppliants who had acknowledged their power, and deprecated their vengeance.

Remains of these superstitions might be traced till past the middle of the last century, though fast becoming obsolete, or passing into mere popular customs of the country, which the peasantry observe, without thinking of their origin. About 1769, when Mr. Pennant made his tour, the ceremony of the Baaltein, Beltane, or First of May, though varying in different districts of the Highlands, was yet in strict observance; and the cake which was then baken with scrupulous attention to certain rites and forms, was divided into fragments, which were formally dedicated to birds or beasts of prey, that they, or rather the being whose agents they were, might spare the flocks and herds.*

Another custom of similar origin lingered late

* See Pennant's Scottish Tour, vol. i. p. 111. The traveller mentions that some festival of the same kind was, in his time, observed in Glouces tershire.