A26888:136
The certainty of the worlds of spirits and, consequently, of the immortality of souls…
The certainty of the worlds of spirits and, consequently, of the immortality of souls of the malice and misery of the devils and the damned : and of the blessedness of the justified, fully evinced by the unquestionable histories of apparitions, operations, witchcrafts, voices &c. / written, as an addition to many other treatises for the conviction of Sadducees and infidels, by Richard Baxter.The certainty of the worlds of spirits and, consequently, of the immortality of souls of the malice and misery of the devils and the damned : and of the blessedness of the justified, fully evinced by the unquestionable histories of apparitions, operations, witchcrafts, voices &c. / written, as an addition to many other treatises for the conviction of Sadduces and infidels, by Richard Baxter.
London: printed for T. Parkhurst, 1691
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
XVII. When I was young, most credible and religious persons born in Wilden-Hall near Wolver-hampton in Stafford-Shire, oft told me (dwelling with me in the same House) that one Richard White a Smith of Wilden-Hall, was a profane Atheistical Man, and believing that there was no Devils, in his Cups would wish he could once see the Devil, if there were such a thing; and that suddenly he changed his Life, and became a professor of zeal, and strictness in Religion, and told them, that in a clear Moonshine Night. the Devil in the shape of a great ugly Man, stood by his Bed side, opening the Curtains, and looking him in the Face, and at last took up the Blanket; and sometime smiled on him, and then was more ugly, and after a while (in which he lay in great Terror) the Apparition Vanished, and he was affrighted into the aforesaid change of Life (as Bruno is said to be the Founder of the Order of Carthusian Fryers.
XVII. When I was young, most credible and religious persons born in Wilden-Hall near Wolver-hampton in Stafford-Shire, oft told me (dwelling with me in the same House) that one Richard White a Smith of Wilden-Hall, was a prophane Atheistical Man, and believing that there was no Devils, in his Cups would wish he could once see the Devil, if there were such a thing; and that suddenly he changed his Life, and became a professor of zeal, and strictness in Religion, and told them, that in a clear Moonshine Night. the Devil in the shape of a great ugly Man, stood by his Bed side, opening the Curtains, and looking him in the Face, and at last took up the Blanket; and sometime smiled on him, and then was more ugly, and after a while (in which he lay in great Terror) the Apparition Vanished, and he was affrighted into the aforesaid change of Life (as Bruno is said to be the Founder of the Order of Carthusian Fryers.
XVIII. My dear Friend Mr. Hopkins (Father to my Faithful Brother Mr. George Hopkins Minister at Eversham, till ejected, Aug. 24 ⟨p. 60⟩1662. and Grandfather to Dr. Hopkins, lately Preacher at Laurences) a chief Magistrate of Bewdley, and since a Member of the Long Parliament, oft pained as he thought with the Spleen, but not at all Melancholy, came to me at Mr. Hanburyes, the last time before I was driven out of the County, and as a great secret told me, that he was possest (meaning, I think Bewitched): I chid him, as Fanciful and Melancholy: But he without any show of Melancholy, affirmed, that it was certainly true: I could not stay with him, and never saw him more. But he long continued in pain and that Conceit, and before he dyed, a piece of Wood came down into the rectum intestinum, which they were fain to pull out with their Fingers His good Wife told me, it was of the length of ones finger: And that he and they were sure that he never swallowed any such thing. The best Men it seems may be thus Afflicted, as Job by Satan.