of him, his rebellion against God, his enmity to man, the reason of
it, his setting himself up in the dark parts of the world to be
worshipped instead of God, &c.

I presume that Milton's 'Paradise Lost' must have been bound up with one
of Crusoe's Bibles; otherwise I should be puzzled to know where he found
all this history of the Old Gentleman. Not a word of it in the Bible
itself, I am quite sure. But to be serious. De Foe did not reflect that
all these difficulties are attached to a mere fiction, or, at the best,
an allegory, supported by a few popular phrases and figures of speech
used incidentally or dramatically by the Evangelists,--and that the
existence of a personal, intelligent, evil being, the counterpart and
antagonist of God, is in direct contradiction to the most express
declarations of Holy Writ. '"Shall there be evil in a city, and the Lord
hath not done it?"' Amos, iii. 6. '"I make peace and create evil."' Isa.
xlv. 7. This is the deep mystery of the abyss of God.

(Vol. ii. p. 3.)
I have often heard persons of good judgment say, ... that there is no
such thing as a spirit appearing, a ghost walking, and the like, &c.

I cannot conceive a better definition of Body than "spirit appearing,"
or of a flesh-and-blood man than a rational spirit apparent. But a
spirit 'per se' appearing is tantamount to a spirit appearing
without its appearances. And as for ghosts, it is enough for a man of
common sense to observe, that a ghost and a shadow are concluded in the
same definition, that is, visibility without tangibility.

(P. 9.)
She was, in a few words the stay of all my affairs, the centre of all