decree that says, "The court understands nothing of the matter" more
freely and ingenuously than the Areopagites did, who, finding themselves
perplexed with a cause they could not unravel, ordered the parties to
appear again after a hundred years.

The witches of my neighbourhood run the hazard of their lives upon the
report of every new author who seeks to give body to their dreams. To
accommodate the examples that Holy Writ gives us of such things, most
certain and irrefragable examples, and to tie them to our modern events,
seeing that we neither see the causes nor the means, will require another
sort-of wit than ours. It, peradventure, only appertains to that sole
all-potent testimony to tell us. "This is, and that is, and not that
other." God ought to be believed; and certainly with very good reason;
but not one amongst us for all that who is astonished at his own
narration (and he must of necessity be astonished if he be not out of his
wits), whether he employ it about other men's affairs or against himself.

I am plain and heavy, and stick to the solid and the probable, avoiding
those ancient reproaches:

"Majorem fidem homines adhibent iis, quae non intelligunt;
--Cupidine humani ingenii libentius obscura creduntur."

["Men are most apt to believe what they least understand: and from
the acquisitiveness of the human intellect, obscure things are more
easily credited." The second sentence is from Tacitus, Hist. 1. 22.]

I see very well that men get angry, and that I am forbidden to doubt upon
pain of execrable injuries; a new way of persuading! Thank God, I am not
to be cuffed into belief. Let them be angry with those who accuse their
opinion of falsity; I only accuse it of difficulty and boldness, and
condemn the opposite affirmation equally, if not so imperiously, with
them. He who will establish this proposition by authority and huffing
discovers his reason to be very weak. For a verbal and scholastic
altercation let them have as much appearance as their contradictors;

"Videantur sane, non affirmentur modo;"

["They may indeed appear to be; let them not be affirmed (Let them
state the probabilities, but not affirm.)"
--Cicero, Acad., n. 27.]

but in the real consequence they draw from it these have much the
advantage. To kill men, a clear and strong light is required, and our
life is too real and essential to warrant these supern