to them. Many of them deserve our pity rather than our scorn; for they
suffered from that species of insanity which, according to Holmes, is
often the logic of an accurate mind overtasked. At any rate, they furnish
an example of that

"Faith, fanatic faith, which, wedded fast
To some dear falsehood, hugs it to the last."




CHAPTER III.

ASTROLOGY, ALCHEMY, AND MAGIC.

Henry Cornelius Agrippa--Joseph Francis Borri--Urban Grandier--Dr. Dee--
Edward Kelly--John Darrell.


Superstition is a deformed monster who dies hard; and like Loki of the
Sagas when the snake dropped poison on his forehead, his writhings shook
the world and caused earthquakes. Now its power is well-nigh dead.
"Superstition! that horrible incubus which dwelt in darkness, shunning the
light, with all its racks and poison-chalices, and foul sleeping-draughts,
is passing away without return." [Footnote: Carlyle.] But society was once
leavened with it. Alchemy, astrology, and magic were a fashionable cult,
and so long as its professors pleased their patrons, proclaimed "smooth
things and prophesied deceits," all went well with them; but it is an easy
thing to offend fickle-minded folk, and when the philosopher's stone and
the secret of perpetual youth after much research were not producible, the