Part 1

Produced by Mardi Desjardins & the online Distributed Proofreaders Canada team at http://www.pgdpcanada.net from page images generously made available by the Internet Archive (https://archive.org)

THE PHILOSOPHY OF MYSTERY.

“We so intreateth this serious and terrible matter of Spirites, that now and then insertyng some strange stories of counterfeyts, doth both very lybely display their falsehood, and also not a little recreate his reader: and yet in the ende he so aptly concludeth to the purpose, that his hystories seeme not idle tales, or impertinent vagaries, but very truethes, naturally falling under the compasse of his matter.”

* * * * *

THE PHILOSOPHY OF MYSTERY.

WALTER COOPER DENDY, FELLOW AND HONORARY LIBRARIAN OF THE MEDICAL SOCIETY OF LONDON; SENIOR SURGEON TO THE ROYAL INFIRMARY FOR CHILDREN, &c. &c.

* * * * *

LONDON: LONGMAN, ORME, BROWN, GREEN, & LONGMANS, PATERNOSTER ROW. ——— 1841.

* * * * *

GILBERT AND RIVINGTON, PRINTERS, St. John’s Square, London.

* * * * *

TO HIS COUSINS,

STEPHEN DENDY, ESQ.

OF PARIS,

AND

CHARLES COOK DENDY, ESQ.

OF SOUTHGATE HOUSE, CHICHESTER;

AND TO HIS BROTHER,

EDWARD STEPHEN DENDY,

THIS VOLUME IS INSCRIBED,

IN TOKEN OF THE AFFECTIONATE REGARD

OF THE AUTHOR.

* * * * *

CONTENTS.

PAGE THE CHALLENGE. Scenery on the Wye—A Ghost Seer—Tintern 1-5 Abbey—Faith and Scepticism in the reality of Phantoms

NATURE AND MOTIVES OF GHOSTS. Notions of the Ancients regarding the nature of 6-17 Ghosts—Confidence of the Ancients in their appearance—Modern Incidents in illustration of real appearance—Qualities of Ghosts—Motives of Apparitions—Ancient and modern Stories

PROPHECY OF SPECTRES. Ancient spectral Prophecy—Modern Stories in 18-33 illustration of prophetic Spectres—Philosophy and Poesy of Shakspere—Holy influence of Spectral Visitations—Stories of apparently special influence of the Deity

ILLUSION OF SPECTRES. Reasons for early faith in Phantoms—Modern errors 34-51 regarding classic Superstitions—Shallowness and Fallacy of modern Incidents—Explanation of Ghost Stories by Coincidence—Incidents in proof of Coincidence—Proneness of intellectual Minds to credulity and exaggeration—Innocent invention of an incident at Bowood