palmestry or the lines of the hands; points marked at random; numbers,
names, the motions of a scene, the air, fire, the Praenestine, Homerian,
and Virgilian lots, dreams, etc.

Whoever reads the Roman historians[14] must be surprised at the number of
prodigies which are constantly recorded, and which frequently filled the
people with the most dreadful apprehensions. It must be confessed, that
some of these seem altogether supernatural; while much the greater part
only consist of some of the uncommon productions of nature, which
superstition always attributed to a superior cause, and represented as
the prognostication of some impending misfortunes. Of this class may be
reckoned the appearance of two suns, the nights illuminated by rays of
light, the views of fighting armies, swords, and spears, darting through
the air; showers of milk, of blood, of stones, of ashes, of frogs,
beasts with two heads, or infants who had some feature resembling those
of the brute creation. These were all dreadful prodigies, which filled
the people with inexpressible astonishment, and the Roman Empire with an
extreme perplexity; and whatever unhappy circumstance followed upon
these, was sure to be either caused or predicted by them.[15]


FOOTNOTES:

[9] Homer gives the same account of those ceremonies, when Ulysses
raised the soul of Tiresias; and the same usages are found in the poem
of Silius Italicus. And to these ceremonies the scriptures frequently
allude, when the Israelites are forbid to assemble upon high places.

[10] The magical slumbers produced in the cave of Trophonius are justly
ascribed to medicated beverages. Here, the votary if he escaped with