And I
more than suspect that this child-credulity rather slumbers in the grown
man, smothered beneath superimposed skepticisms and cognitions, than is
ever eradicated from his mind, and thus, upon the shock of an emergency
disturbing him suddenly to the foundation, is ready to burst up through
the crevices of his shattered practical experience and appear on the
surface of his judgment and understanding.
In addition, then, to an instinctive tendency to religious superstition,
(of which I shall here say nothing,) to the fairy mythology of the
nursery, and the phantom machinery invented by poets to clothe with the
semblance of reality their dreams and fancies, can be traced in a great
measure the existence in the mind of the _credulity_ which renders the
_fear_ in question possible, opening an introduction for it into the
heart excited by inexplicable phenomena or circumstanced where such
phenomena might, according to our superstitious beliefs, easily occur.
Without entering into an analysis of the _fear_ itself, beyond the
remark that any extraordinary sight or sound not immediately explicable
by the eye or ear to the understanding (as a steamboat to the Indians or
a comet to our ancestors) is a legitimate cause of the emotion, as well
as the _possibility_ of the occurrence of such sights and sounds,
for believing which we have seen man prepared, first by natural
superstitious inclination, and secondly by a peculiar education,--I will
only further add, for the purpose of a brief introduction to an anecdote
I wish to relate, that there is another fountain of knowledge, from
which we drink at a later period than childhood, as well as then, whose
waters are strongly impregnated with this superstitious, fear-provoking
credulity: I mean the stories of _ghosts_ which have been seen and heard
in all ages and countries, revealing important secrets, pointing out
the places where murder has been committed or treasure concealed,
foretelling deaths and calamities, and forewarning men of impending
dangers.
Pages:
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219