abbey in the dead of the night. On the western side the rods turned over each other with inconceivable rapidity; yet, on digging, nothing but a coffin could be discovered. The man of art retired to the abbey, and then a storm arose which nearly destroyed the west end of the church, extinguished all the candles but one, and this burned dimly, and made the rods immoveable. Lilly succeeded at length in charming away the demon, but no persuasion could induce him to make another experiment in that species of divination.

His first tutor, Evans, a debauched Welsh parson, had already initiated him in his astrology, and, after seven or eight weeks' study, he had been able to set a figure perfectly. Of this he had given a public specimen, by intimating that the king had chosen an unlucky horoscope for his coronation in Scotland in 1633. The library of a second Evans, who far exceeded the first, having accidentally come into the possession of our astral tyro, determined his future leading study; and henceforth he became a professed astrologer.

Few disciples of Sidrophel have done more than Lilly to establish the justice of the hard words which the learned knight and physician, Sir Christopher Heydon, who flourished nearly at the same time, has objected so much to, as used by his antagonist Mr. Chambers. Mr. Chambers says "all astrologers are damned, that they are worse than witches, waggling wits, giddy pates, juggling jacks, coggling figure flingers, paltry ignorant wizards, stable-keepers of Augeas, foul dungheaps, Babylonical jumblers, Balaam's asses, sons of ditch-drabs, and confederates of the Devil." He adds, with equal mildness, that "their mother was a Hittite, that the magistrate who refuses to expel them is worse than an infidel, and that those are happy who shall bruise their bones and limbs against the stones." Lilly, it was clear, deserved as much of these reproaches as will fairly attach to one who has been well described as a man who, by dint of plain, persevering, consistent, unblushing roguery, acquired a decent reputation, convinced himself that he was honest, put money into his pocket, and in due time was comfortably buried under a nice black marble stone, inscribed with a record of deceased virtue in English and Latin." His roguery consisted in maintaining the triple character of impostor, thief, and pimp. His reputation arose from prophesying alternately on the side of the king and the parliament, as the scale of each inclined. His money was made by interested marriages; by pensions for furnishing the existing government with artful intelligence; by presents, and by pupils. His first wife left him 1,000l. for six years conjugal service. His second wife brought him 5001. but she was extravagant, and spent more than her portion. The parliament gave him occasional donations, and a pension of 1001. a year. The king of Sweden sent him a gold chain and medal worth fifty pounds, for the honourable mention which was made of his majesty in the Almanack for the year 1657, and 1658; and after having lectured publicly on astrology for a few years, we find him expending nearly 4000l. in the purchase of estates. His funeral achievements were arranged by his sage admirer, Elias Ashmole, who procured a Latin and English elegy on his death, from the afterwards well-known bishop of Smal ridge, at that time a scholar of Westminster school.

A single anecdote will amply illustrate Lilly's character. In his Almanack for 1653, he asserted that the parliament stood on a tisklish foundation, and that the commonality and soldiery would join together against it. For this he was called upon by the House. Before

his appearance, however, he contrived to have six copies of the Almanack printed, in which the offensive passages were omitted. These he produced from his pocket at the bar; contending that they only were genuine, and that the others were surreptitiously circulated under his name by some enemy who sought to ruin him.

Lilly has furnished us with the portrait of some of his contemporary fellow students. Forman, Bredan, Bubb, Hart, and Pool. The first is notorious for his connexion with the detestable countess of Essex. The second, who was a clergyman, was distinguished for his love of tobacco and strong drink; insomuch, that "when he had no tobacco, he would cut up the bell-ropes and smoke them. The third was pilloried for certain knavish practices in the " conynge" art. The fourth escaped the same punishment by running away; and the fifth avoided the elevation of the gallows for theft, by absconding in time. Yet these were the sort of men at whose annual festival the learned Ashmole condescended to officiate as steward. A few years before his death, Lilly adopted Henry Coley, a tailor, as his successor; this worthy had been his amanuensis, and traded in prophecy with success almost equal to that of his master.

At the revolution, astrology declined, and notwithstanding the labours of the immortal Partridge then, and those of Ebenezer Sibley, which in our own days fill two quarto volumes, the art may now be considered as exploded. The gradual march of knowledge and civilization has every where, unless in the East, tended to extinguish this among other superstitions, by which the blind anxiety of men sought to penetrate futurity. There are few believers left among us, even in the more admissible solar and lunar influences; and as for the connexion of destiny with the stars, most even of the purchasers of Moore's almanacks would, if pressed hard, be ready to admit the justice of Cardinal Mazarine's dying remark. When that minister lay on his death-bed, a comet happened to appear; and there were not wanting flatterers to insinuate that it was in reference to his approaching end. He answered with a manly pleasantry, "Messieurs, la comète me fait trop d'honour.”

A belief in judicial astrology can now only exist in the people who may be said to have no belief at all; for mere traditional sentiments can hardly be said to amount to a belief. But a faith in this ridiculous system in our own country is of late existence; it was a favourite superstition with the learned, and whenever an idea germinates in a learned head, it shoots with additional luxuriance.

When Charles the First was confined, Lilly the astrologer was consulted for the hour which would favour his escape.

The most respectable characters of the age, Sir William Dugdale, Elias Ashmole, Dr. Grew, and others, were members of an astrological club. Congreve's character of Foresight, in Love for Love, was then no uncommon person, though the humour now is scarcely intelligible. Dryden cast the nativities of his sons.

It has been reported of several famous for their astrologic skill, that they have suffered a voluntary death, merely to verify their own predictions; this has been said of Cardan, and of Burton the author of the Anatomy of Melancholy.

It is curious to observe the shifts to which astrologers are put when their predictions are not verified. Great winds were predicted by a famous adept, about the year 1586. No unusual storms, however, happened. Bodin, to save the reputation of the art, applied it as a figure to some revolutions in the state; and of which there were instances enough at that moment. Among their lucky and unlucky days, astrologers pretend to give those of various illustrious persons and of families. One is very striking.-Thursday was the unlucky day of our Henry the Eighth. He, his son Edward the Sixth, queen Mary, and queen Elizabeth, all died on a Thursday.

The life of Lilly the astrologer, written by himself, is a curious work. He is the Sidrophel of Butler in his Hudibras.

Astrology greatly flourished in the time of the civil wars. The royalists and the rebels had their astrologers, as well as their soldiers, and the predictions of the former had a great influence over the latter.

In 1670 the passion for horoscopes, and expounding the stars, prevailed in France among the first rank. The new-born child was usually presented naked to the astrologer, who read in its forehead, and the transverse lines in its hand, and thence wrote down its future destiny. Catherine de Medicis brought Henry the Fourth, then a child, to old Nostradamus, whom antiquaries esteem more for his Chronicle of Provence, than his vaticinating powers. The sight of the reverend seer, with a beard which "streamed like a meteor in the air," is said to have terrified the future hero.-Will it be credited, that one of these magicians having assured Charles the Ninth that he would live as many days as he could turn about upon his heels in an hour standing upon one leg, that his majesty every morning performed that solemn exercise for an hour? the principal officers of the court, the judges, the chancellors, and generals likewise, in compliment, standing on one leg, and turning round!

WITCHCRAFT,

THIS was a supernatural power, which persons were formally supposed to obtain the possession of, by entering into compact with the devil. They gave themselves up to him, body and soul; and he engaged that they should want for nothing, and that he would avenge them upon all their enemies. As soon as the bargain was concluded, the devil delivered to the witch an imp, or familiar spirit, to be ready at a call, and to do whatever it was directed. By the assistance of this imp of the devil, the witch, who was almost always an old woman, was enabled to transport herself in the air on a broomstick or a spit to distant places, to attend the meeting of the witches, at which the devil always presided. They were enabled also to transform themselves into various shapes, particularly to assume the form of cats and hares, in which they most delighted; to inflict diseases

on whomsoever they thought proper; and to punish their enemies in a variety of ways.

The belief that certain persons were endowed with supernatural power, and that they were assisted by invisible spirits, is very ancient. The sages of the Romans seem rather to have been sorcerers than witches; indeed, the idea of a witch, as above described, could not have been prevalent till after the propagation of Christianity, as the heathens had no knowledge of the evil spirit, styled by Christians the devil. Witchcraft was universally believed in Europe till the sixteenth century, and even maintained its ground with tolerable firmness till the middle of the seventeenth. Vast numbers of reputed witches were convicted, and condemned to be burnt, every year. The methods of discovering them were various. One was, to weigh the supposed criminal against the church bible, which, if she was guilty, would preponderate; another, by making her attempt to say the Lord's prayerthis no witch was able to repeat entirely, but would omit some part or sentence thereof. It is remarkable, that all witches did not hesitate at the same place; some leaving out one part, and some another. Teats, through which the imps sucked, were indubitable marks of a witch; these were always raw, and also insensible, and, if squeezed, sometimes yielded a drop of blood. A witch could not weep more than three tears, and that only out of the left eye. This want of tears was, by the witch-finders, and even by some judges, considered as a very substantial proof of guilt. Swimming a witch, was another kind of popular ordeal generally practised; for this she was stripped naked, and cross bound, the right thumb to the left toe, and the left thumb to the right toe. Thus prepared, she was thrown into a pond or river, in which, if guilty, she could not sink; for having, by her compact with the devil, renounced the benefit of the water of baptism, that element, in its return, renounced her, and refused to receive her into its bosom. Sir Robert Filmer mentions two others, by fire: the first, by burning the thatch of the house of the suspected witch; the other, burning any animal supposed to be bewitched by her, as a hog or ox: these, it was held, would force a witch to confess. The trial by a stool, was another method used for the discovery of witches. It was thus managed. Having taken the suspected witch, she was placed in the middle of a room upon a stool or table, cross-legged, or in some uncasy posture, to which if she submitted not, she was then bound with cords; there she was watched, and kept without meat or sleep for the space of twenty-four hours, for they said, within that time they should see her imp come and suck. A little hole was likewise made in the door, for imps to come in at; and lest it should come in some less discernible shape, they that watched were taught to be ever and anon sweeping the room, and, if they saw any spiders or flies, to kill them; if they could not kill them, then they might be sure they were imps. If witches, under any examination or torture, would not confess, all their apparel was changed, and every hair of their body shaven off with a sharp razor, lest they should secrete magical charms to prevent their confessing. Witches were most apt to confess on Fridays. By such trials as these, and by the accusation of children, old women, and fools, were thousands of unhappy women

condemned for witchcraft, and burnt at the stake. It would be ridiculous to attempt a serious refutation of the existence of witches, and at present, luckily, the task is unnecessary. In this country, at least, the discouragement long given to all suspicion of witchcraft, and the repeal of the statutes against that crime, have very much weakened, though perhaps they have not entirely eradicated, the persuasion. On the continent, too, it is evidently on the decline; and notwithstanding the exertions of Dr. De Haen, and of the celebrated Lavater, we have little doubt that in a short time posterity will woDder at the credulity of their ancestors. That there ever were witches, is an opinion that cannot for a mo. ment be believed by a thinking man. The actions imputed to them were either absurd or impossible; the witnesses, by whose evidence they were condemned, being either weak enthusiasts or downright villains; and the confessions ascribed to the witches themselves, the effects of a disordered imagination, procured by cruel treatment and excessive watchings. As to the nightly meetings, demonologists themselves have been obliged to confess that they were nothing else but uneasy dreams, often produced by soporific compositions. The facts which have been brought forward by the advocates for witchcraft bear in their front the most evident marks of trick and imposture; and this has constantly been found out, whenever these facts have been properly examined. The crime of witchcraft, which was punished capitally by the law of Moses, was justly punished under the Jewish Theocracy, as an act of rebellion against the Divine Majesty, in attempting to deceive the people by leading them to trust in demons and other imaginary beings.

SORCERY, OR MAGIC.

THIS is the power which some persons were formerly supposed to possess, of commanding the devil and the infernal spirits, by skill in charms and invocations, and of soothing them by fumigation. Sorcery is therefore to be distinguished from witchcraft, it being an art which was supposed to be practised, not only by commanding evil spirits, but by compact with the devil. As an instance of the power of bad smells over demons or evil spirits, we may mention the flight of the evil spirit mentioned in Tobit, into the remote parts of Egypt, produced, it is said, by the smell of the burnt liver of a fish. Lilly informs us, that one Evans, having raised a spirit at the request of Lord Bothwell and Sir Kenelm Digby, and forgetting a fumigation, the spirit, vexed at the disappointment, pulled him without the circle, and carried him from his house in the Minories, into a field near Battersea Causeway. King James, in his Demonologia, has given a full account of the art of sorcery.

very

"Two principal things (says he) cannot well in that errand be wanted; holy water, and some present of a living thing unto him. These things being all prepared, circles are made, triangular, quadrangular, round, double, or single, according to the form of the apparition they

crave.

When the conjured spirit appears, which will not be until after many ceremonies, Lord's prayers, and much muttering and mur