Curiosities & wonders > Demonology and witchcraft

354
LETTERS ON
sciousness on his own part. It is a rare occurrence,
indeed, to find an opportunity of dealing with an actual
ghost-seer; such instances, however, I have certainly
myself met with, and that in the case of able, wise,
candid, and resolute persons, of whose veracity I had
every reason to be confident. But in such instances,
shades of mental aberration have afterwards occurred,
which sufficiently accounted for the supposed appari¬
tions, and will incline me always to feel alarmed
in behalf of the continued health of a friend, who
should conceive himself to have witnessed such a
visitation.
The nearest approximation which can be generally
made to exact evidence in this case, is the word of some
individual who has had the story, it may be, from the
person to whom it has happened, but most likely from
his family, or some friend of the. family. Far more
commonly, the narrator possesses no better means of
knowledge than that of dwelling in the country where
the thing happened, or being well acquainted with the
outside of the mansion in the inside of which the ghost
appeared.
In every point, the evidence of such a second-hand
retailer of the mystic story must fall under the adjudged
case in an English court. The judge stopped a witness
who was about to give an account of the murder upon
trial, as it was narrated to him by the ghost of the
murdered person. “ Hold, sir,” said his lordship;
“ the ghost is an excellent witness, and his evidence
the best possible ; but he cannot be heard by proxy in
this court. Summon him hither, and I’ll hear him in