Translated by Jenna Ehlinger
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Another gentleman was brought to be buried in the same very church. The friends on either side came to debate who would enter the Church first, and in a trice from words, they came to blows. One of the number (who was armed with bow and arrows) let one fly among them. (Now every family in that Isle has their burial place in the Church in stone chests, and the bodies are carried in open biers to the burial place.) Sir Normand, having appeased the tumult/commotion, one of the arrows was found shot in the dead man’s thigh. To this, Sir Normand was a witness.
In the account which Mr. Daniel Morison, parson in Lewis, gave, there was one, though it be divergent from the subject, yet it may be worth your notice. It was of a young woman in his parish who was mightily frightened by seeing her own image still before her, always when she came to the open air; the back of the image being always to her, so that it was not a reflection as in a mirror, but the species of such a body as her own and in a very like dress, which appeared to herself continually before her.
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The parson kept her a long while with him, but had no remedy for her evil, which troubled her exceedingly. I was told afterwards that when she was four or five years older, she did not see it.
These are matters of fact, which I assure you they are truly related. But these and all others that occurred to me by information or otherwise, could never lead me into a remote conjecture of the cause of such an extraordinary phenomenon. Whether it be a quality in the eyes of some people into these parts, concurring with a quality in the air also; whether such species be everywhere, though not seen by the want of the eyes so qualified, or from whatever other cause, I must leave to the inquiry of clearer judgements than mine. But a hint may be taken from this image which appeared still to this woman above mentioned, and from another mentioned by Aristotle, in the 4th of his Metaphysics (if I remember correctly, for it is long since I read it;) as also from the common opinion that young infants (unsullied with many objects) do see apparitions, which were
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Not seen by those of older years; as likewise from this, that several did see the second sight when in the Highlands or Isles, yet when transported to live in other countries, especially in America, they quite lose this quality as was told to me by a gentleman who know some of them in Barbados who did see no visions there, although he know them to be seers when they lived in the Isles of Scotland. Thus far my Lord Tarbett.
My Lord, after narrow inquisition has delivered many true and remarkable observations on this subject; yet to encourage a further scrutiny, I beg leave to say,
That 1. But a few women are endued with sight in respect of men, and their predictions are not so certain.
2. This sight is not criminal, since a man can come by it unawares, and without his consent; but it is certain he sees more fatal and fearful things than he does pleasant.
3. The seer assert, that several who go
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To the Siths, (or people at rest, and, in respect of us, in Peace,) before the natural period of their life expire, do frequently appear to them.
4. A vehement desire to attain this airt (?) is very helpful to the inquirer; and the species of an absent friend, which appears to the seers as clearly as if he had sent his lively picture to present itself before him, is no fantastic shadow of a sick apprehension, but a reality, and a messenger, coming for unknown reasons, not from the original likeness of itself, but from a more swift and pragmatic people, which recreate themselves in offering secret intelligence to men, though generally they are unacquainted with that kind of correspondence, as if they had lived in a different element from them.
5. Though my collections were written long before I say my Lord of Tarbet, yet I am glad that his description and mine correspond so nearly. The maid my Lord mentions, who saw her image still before her, corresponds with the co-walker named in my account; which though
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Some, at first thought, might conjecture to be by the refraction of a cloud or mist, as in the parallel, (the whole air and every drop of water being a mirror to return the species of things, were our visive faculty (power of vision- to grow) sharp enough to understand them,) or a natural reflection from the same reasons that an echo can be intensified by airt (?); yet it were more feasible to assign this second sight to a quality infused into the eye by an unction: for witches have a sleeping ointment, that, when applied, troubles their fantasies, advancing it to have unusual figures and shapes represented to it, as if it were a fit of fanaticism, hypochondriac melancholy, or possession of some insinuating spirit, raising the soul beyond its common strain, if the palpable instances and realities seen, and innocently objected to the senses did not disprove it, make the matter a palpable truth, and no deception; yet since this sight can be bestowed without ointment or dangerous compact, the qualification is not of so bad an origin. Therefore,
6. By my Lord’s good leave, I presume to
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say, that this sight can be of no quality of the air nor of the eyes; because, 1. Such as live in the same air, and see all other things as far off and as clearly, yet have not the second sight. 2. A seer can give another person the sight transiently, by putting his hand and foot in the posture he requires of him. 3. The unsullied eyes of infants can naturally perceive no new unaccustomed object, but what appear to other men, unless exalted and clarified some way, as Ballaam’s ass for a time; though in a witches eye the beholder cannot see his own image reflected, as in the eyes of other people; so the defect of objects, as well as diversities of the subject, may appear differently on several tempers and ages. 4. Thought also some are of so venomous a constitution, by being eradicated in envy and malice, that they pierce and kill (like a cockatrice) whatever creature they first set their eye on in the morning; so was it with Walter Grahame, some time living in the Parish where I am now, who killed his own cow after commending its fatness, and
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Shot a hare with his eyes, having praised its swiftness, (such was the infection of an evil eye;) albeit this was unusual, yet he saw no object but what was obvious to other men as well as to himself. 5. If the being transported to live in another country did obscure the second sight, neither the parson not the maid needed be much troubled for her self-reflection; a little pilgrimage, and going from her wonted home, would have solved her fear. Wherefore,
7. Since the things seen by the seers are real entities, the prefaces and predictions found true, but a few endues with this sight, and those not of bad lives, or addicted to malifices, the true solution of the phenomenon seems rather to be, the courteous endeavours of our fellow creatures in the invisible world to convince us, (in opposition to Sadducee’s, Socinian, and atheists,) of a deity; of spirits; of a possible and harmless method of correspondence between men and them, even in this life; of their operation for our caution and warning; of the orders and degrees
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Of angels, whereof one order, with bodies of air condensed and curiously shaped, may be next to man, superior to him in understanding, yet unconfirmed; and of their region, habitation, and influences on man, greater than that of stars on inanimate bodies; a knowledge (belike) reserved for these last atheistic ages, wherein the profanity of men’s lives have debauched and blinded their understanding, as to Moses, Jesus, and the Prophets, (unless they get convictions from things formerly known,) as from the regions of the dead: nor does the the ceasing of the visions, upon the seers transmigration into foreign kingdoms, make his Lordship’s conjecture of the quality of a whit more probable; but, on the contrary, it confirms greatly my account of an invisible people, guardian over and careful of men, who have their different offices and abilities in distinct countries, as appears in Dan. 10. 13. Viz. about Israel’s, Greece’s, and Persia’s assistant Princes, whereof who so prevails gives dominion and ascendant to his pills and vassals over
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The opposite armies and countries; so that every country and kingdom having their topical spirits, or powers assisting and governing them, the Scottish seer banished to America being a stranger there, as well to the invisible as to the visible inhabitants, and wanting a familiarity of his former correspondents, he could not have the favour and warnings, by the several visions and predictions which were wont to be granted him by these acquaintances and favorites in his own country. For if what he wont to see were realities, (as I have made appear,) they were too great an honor for Scotland to have such seldom-seen watchers and predominant powers over it alone, acting in it so expressly, and all other nations wholly destitute of the like; though, without all uncertainty, all other people wanted the right key of their cabinet, and the exact method of correspondence with them, except the sagacious active Scots, as many of them have retained it of a long time, and by surprises and raptures do often foretell what in kindness is really represented to them at
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Several occasions. To which purpose the learned lynx-eyed Mr. Baxter, on Rev. 12. 7. Writing of the fight between Michael and the Dragon, gives a very pertinent note, viz. That he knows not but before any great action (especially tragical) is done on earth, that first the battle and victory is acted and achieved in the air between the good and evil spirits: thus he. It seems these were the men’s guardians; and similar battles are often times perceived in a sky in the nighttime; the event of which might easily be represented by someone of the number to a correspondent on earth, as frequently the report of great actions have been more swiftly carried to other countries than all the airt (?) of us mortal could possibly dispatch it. Saint Austin, on Mark,, 9. 4. Gives no small intimation of the truth, averring that Elias appeared with Jesus on the Mount in his proper body, but Moses in an aerial body, assumed like the angels who appeared, and had ability to eat with Abraham, though no necessity on the account of their bodies. As likewise the late doctrine of the pre-existence of souls, living into aerial vehicles, gives a singular hint of the possibility of the thing, if not a direct proof of the while assertion; which yet moreover may be illuminated but diverse other instances of the like nature, and as wonderful, besides what is above said.
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Pages 59-78 will be translated in the future.