against the fears of a future state, no, not that seemingly fortify it, and these are:

1. Innocence, or a good heart, founded in religion, virtue, and an exact rectitude of behaviour. Or,

2. Impudence, a hardened shutting the eyes against conviction, and the ears against conscience.

It is with some perplexity that I found myself obliged to give a character, in another place, of a famed man of pretended brightness and wit; he was always merry, a constant smile sat upon his countenance, a perfect easiness possessed his mind, he knew not a moment of melancholy or chagrin ; he never sighed, because he seldom prayed or grieved, I wish I could have said, because he never sinned; his heart was light as his head; and as for his heels, he always walked in minuet and rigadoons; his mirth was as uninterrupted as his breath, and he laughed by the consequence of respiration; his voice was a natural music, and his rhetoric was all sonnet and solfa's.

must have

Sure, said I, my cousin Mthe clearest conscience in the universe, he has not the least scar upon his inside, and, if he was to see the Devil, he could not change colour, or have the least hesitation at the most frightful appearance: he must be all innocence and virtue :

Did the least spot upon his soul appear!

It could not be his conscience must be clear:

:

For where there's guilt there always would be fear.

But I mistook my kinsman most extremely; for, on the contrary, his soul is blacker than negro Sancho, the beauty of Africa; he boasts himself of the most hardened crime, defies Heaven, despises terror, and is got above fear, by the mere force of a flagrant assurance.

He would no more value seeing the Devil, in his

most fiery, formidable appearance, than he would to see a storm of fire in the Tempest, or a harlequin diable in Fresco; if you will take his character from himself, he has no more fear about him than he has conscience, and that's so little, 'tis not worth naming; he knows no sorrow, no chagrin; he was born laughing, and intends to die jesting: and what is all this founded upon? not glorious innocence, mentioned above, but notorious impudence.

It is true, indeed, I had not cared to speak so grossly of one of my near relations, but he will have it so, he speaks it of himself, bids me take notice of it, that it is the character he gives me of himself, and d- ―s me with a full stream of Billingsgate if I dare to give any other character of him than what he gives of himself.

I must acknowledge, I did believe the Devil and my cousin were not much at strife, that he did not fear the old dragon, because he had never done anything to disoblige him; but, it seems, the case differs, and he defies the Devil purely upon the same foot that he defies him that made the Devil, and acts the fury merely as a fury, not as a man of sense, or as a man of courage.

All that I have to say to this, is, that this will last just till the rage is abated, and no longer; till the blood cools, and the spirits return to their natural course, and then the wretch will be as cold as now he is hot, as calm as now he is outrageous, and as base and low-spirited as now he is fiery and furious.

All the hot-headed courage of these men is only a flash, a meteor in the air; when they are cooled, when the exhalation is spent, they are as phlegmatic as other people; and then they look pale, the countenance changes, and the knees knock one against another, as well as other people's.

There's no scorning the terrors of a messenger from the other world, but by a settled, established

composure of the soul, founded on the basis of peace within, peace of conscience, peace and innocence, or peace and penitence, which is, in effect, all one: this is the only face that a man can hold up to the Devil; with a clean heart he may boldly see the Devil, talk to him, despise him, and tell him he scorns him, for that he has nothing at all to do with him.

But this is not our present condition; few people wear this armour in our days; they neither value it, or know the use of it, and therefore it is that we are so full of terror and disturbance when we see the Devil, at least if we think he has anything to say to us.

so?

But now for the great question, Why it should be As I said, it is truth too evident that it is so, but to say that it should be so, that requires another kind of sophistry to make out.

It is true, it requires a great deal of courage, and of cool courage too, in bearing up the soul against the surprise of such things as these; a man must be able to talk to the Devil in a dialect which he, Satan, himself does not very well understand, to bid him begone, to bid him Get thee behind me, and the like; it is an authoritative way of talking that every one cannot support; and if the Devil is sensible of it, he will not fail to exert himself to the utmost, to maintain the right which he seems to enjoy, and keep the hold he has gotten; for he knows how ill his cause is to be defended by justice and reason, and if he should answer as he did to the sons of Scæva the Jew, what then if you should say to him, in the vulgar and ignorant dialect of speaking to spirits, In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, Who art thou? or, I charge thee in the name of the Father, &c., to be gone, and disturb me no more.

I say, if the Devil should answer, The Father I

know, and the Son I know, and the Holy Ghost I know, but who are you, you that pretend to use their names thus? What would you say for your

self?

Now that we may know how to answer the Devil as well as how to speak to him, (for both are very necessary,) let me enter into the state of the case a little, between the Devil and us; nay, between all the inhabitants of the invisible world, and their friends in this, let them be who or of what kind they will.

First, In order to be free from the surprise of these things, you must endeavour to establish your mind in the right understanding of the thing called apparition; that you may reason yourself into a sufficient firmness and steadiness of soul against all the whimsical and imaginary part of it.

Let us think of things as they are, not as they are only imagined, and supposed to be; for it is the reality of the thing, not the shadow, that can fright and disorder us, that is to say, that can have any just reason to do so.

For want of this we are often scared and terrified with dreams and visions, even when we are awake, and when really there is no such thing in substance or reality as any vision or apparition, other than apprehension throws in upon us, and other than our bewitched imagination represents to us.

It is absolutely necessary, if you would not be always looking over your shoulders, and always forming spectres to your fancy: I say, it is necessary to have a right notion of apparition in general; to know what it is, and what it must be, whence it comes, and what the utmost of its commission can be; that you may think yourself into a true and clear understanding of it, and then your fears about it will be regulated after another manner. For example:

1. Establish your mind in this particular and fundamental article, that whatever appears, it must be either a good spirit from the invisible world, an agent of mercy, a messenger of peace, and consequently will do you no hurt: or,

2. An evil spirit, an agent of hell from Satan's region and empire, the air; and that so, whatever evil design or evil message he pretends to come about, and however mischievous his intention is, he cannot do the hurt he desires, because that as the good spirits are under direction, so the bad are under limitation; the one will not, and the other cannot hurt you, without an immediate command from above. The fear therefore which we have upon us concerning apparition, is not or ought not to be guided by their appearance, but by the rectitude of our own thoughts; and as we are or are not quiet and calm within, so we shall or shall not be under apprehensions from without.

Fortify your minds then with a steady confidence in the Supreme maker and governor of all things, who has the great red dragon in a chain; and when you think you see the Devil, fear nothing, for he will never let loose the destroyer upon any one whose mind is steadily fixed upon himself.

This is a critical, and perhaps a too curious piece of practice for me to meddle with, especially here, and must be but gently touched at; you will, it may be, object too against the doctrine of it, and say, Who can so effectually trust in God, as not to be at all afraid of the Devil? Now, though this may seem true upon many accounts, and, as times go with us, may be really a just objection, yet, if we will believe history or experience, it is not so much a difficulty as to say, Who can do it? for it has been done.

I remember the known and famous story of a maid under a real and personal possession of the