female companions was big with child, affirmed there were fourteen
in the room, and that, instead of portending one of the company should
die, it plainly foretold one of them should be born. Had not my friend
found out this expedient to break the omen, I question not but half the
women in the company would have fallen sick that very night.

12. An old maid, that is troubled with the vapours, produces infinite
disturbances of this kind among her friends and neighbours. I know a
maiden aunt, of a great family, who is one of these antiquated Sibyls,
that forebodes and prophesies from one end of the year to the other. She
is always seeing apparitions, and hearing dead-watches; and was the
other day almost frightened out of her wits by the great house-dog, that
howled in the stable at a time when she lay ill of the tooth-ache.

13. Such an extravagant cast of mind engages multitudes of people not
only in impertinent terrors, but in supernumerary duties of life; and
arises from that fear and ignorance which are natural to the soul of
man.

14. The horror with which we entertain the thoughts of death (or indeed
of any future evil) and the uncertainty of its approach, fill a
melancholy mind with innumerable apprehensions and suspicions, and
consequently dispose it to the observation of such groundless prodigies
and predictions. For as it is the chief concern of wise men, to retrench
the evils of life by the reasonings of philosophy; it is the employment
of fools to multiply them by the sentiments of superstition.

15. For my own part, I should be very much troubled were I endowed with
this divining quality, though it should inform me truly of every thing
that can befal me. I would not anticipate the relish of any happiness,
nor feel the weight of any misery, before it actually arrives.

16. I know but one way of fortifying my soul against these gloomy
presages and terrors of mind; and that is, by securing to myself the
friendship and protection of that Being, who disposes of events and
governs futurity. He sees, at one view, the whole thread of my
existence, not only that part of it which I have already passed through,
but that which runs forward into all the depths of eternity.

17. When I lay me down to sleep, I recommend myself to his care; when I
awake, I give myself up to his direction. Amidst all the evils that
threaten me, I will look up to him for help, and question not but he
will either avert them, or turn them t