But to resume the subject of dæmoniacs, the opinion, which I propose in this treatise, is not purely my own, but also of several other persons, before me, eminent for piety and learning. And indeed among our own countrymen, it was in the last century defended in an excellent dissertation, by that treasure of sacred knowledge, the reverend _Joseph Mead_. Wherefore as I have the honour to be of the same family with him, and am the son of _Matthew Mead_, a very able divine, I always thought I might lay some claim to these studies, by a kind of hereditary right. I am not insensible of the difficulty of removing vulgar errors, especially those which relate to religion. For every body knows the power of education, in imprinting on the mind notions, which are hard to be effaced even in adult age. Children in the dark, fear ghosts and hobgoblins; and hence often quake with the same fear through the whole course of their lives. Why then do we admire, if we can hardly unlearn, and clear our minds of, some false notions, even when we are advancing to old age? Nor will this be deemed indeed a matter of little importance by him, who considers the serious evils, into which mankind are often led, by things that to some may appear trifling, as being nothing more than bugbears of children and women. My soul is seized with horror on recollecting, how many millions of innocent persons have been condemned to the flames in various nations, since the birth of Christ, upon the bare suspicion of witchcraft: while the very judges were perhaps either blinded by vain prejudices, or dreaded the incensed populace, if they acquitted those, whom the mob had previously adjudged guilty. Who would believe that any man in his right senses could boast, as a matter of merit, that he had capitally condemned about nine hundred persons for witchcraft, in the space of fifteen years, in the sole dutchy of _Lorraine_?[31] And yet from many histories, which he relates of those who suffered, it manifestly appears, that every individual of these criminals, had no compacts with devils, as they themselves imagined, but were really mad, so as openly to confess that they had done such feats as are impossible in the nature of things. But so it happens, that error generally begets superstition, and superstition cruelty. Wherefore I most heartily rejoice, that I have lived to see all our laws relating to witchcraft entirely abolished: whereas foreign states still retain this barbarous cruelty, and with various degrees of obstinacy in proportion to their ignorance of natural causes. And it is but too true, that the doctrine of dæmons is so understood by the vulgar, as if the devil was to be esteemed a sort of deity; or at least, that, laying the fear of him aside, no divine worship can well subsist; altho’ the apostle has expresly said; _For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil_.[32] [31] See _Nic. Remigii Dæmonolatreia_.