Unquestionably, then, those beliefs which have exerted so potent an influence in the past over the minds or affairs of men, which continue to exert such influence to-day, and, for ought we know to the contrary, may extend that influence indefinitely, are not to be whistled down the wind, or kept hidden away under lock and key, especially when we reflect that the most terrible examples of the frailty of all human judgments concerning these beliefs have utterly failed to remove the groundwork upon which they rest. There still remains the sentimental side of superstition to consider. What, for example, would become of much of our best literature, if all those apt and beautiful figures culled from the rich stores of ancient mythology--the very flowers of history, so to speak--were to be weeded out of it with unsparing hand? What would Greek and Roman history be with their gods and goddesses left out? With what loving and appreciative art our greatest poets have gathered up the scattered legends of the fading past. Some one has cunningly said that superstition is the poetry of life, and that of all men poets should be superstitious. As a matter of history, it is well known that our Puritan ancestors came over here filled full of the prevalent superstitions of the old country; yet even they had waged uncompromising warfare against all such ceremonious observances as could be traced back to heathen mythology. Thus, although they cut down May-poles, they had too much reverence for the Bible to refuse to believe in witches. Writers like Mr. Hawthorne have supposed that the wild and extravagant mysteries of their savage neighbors, may, to some extent, have become incorporated with their own beliefs. However that may be, it is certain that the Puritan fathers believed in no end of pregnant omens, also in ghosts, apparitions, and witches, as well as in a personal devil, with whom, indeed, later on, they had no end of trouble. In short, if anything happened out of the common, the devil was in it. So say many to-day. A certain amount of odium has attached itself to the Puritan fathers of New England, on this account, among unreflecting or ill-natured critics at least, just as if, upon leaving Old England, those people would be expected to leave their superstitions behind them, like so much useless luggage. As a matter of fact, rank superstition was the common inheritance of all peoples of that day and generation, whether Jew or Gentile, Frenchman or Dutchman, Virginian or New Englander. Of its wide prevalence in Old England we find ample proof ready to our hand. For example: