Solomon's Secret Arts (85 page)

20.
A Guide to Health, Beauty, Riches, and Honor
(2nd ed., London, 1796), pp. iv, 34–6.

21.
Cyprian Blagden, “Thomas Carnan and the Almanac Monopoly,”
Studies in Bibliography
, 14 (1961), pp. 24–45; RSC, reel 99, box D, files 1–16. See also Ellic Howe, “The Stationers’ Company Almanacks: A Late Eighteenth-Century Printing and Publishing Operation,” in Giles Parker and Bernhard Fabian, eds,
Buch und Buchhandlung in Europa im achtzehnten Jahrhundert: The Book and the Book Trade in Eighteenth Century Europe
(Hamburg, 1981), pp. 195–209.

22.
RSC, reel 85, Disbursements 1777–8; reel 98, box B, file 6.

23.
William Hone,
The Year Book of Daily Recreation and Information
(London, 1832), col. 117; see also Maureen Perkins,
Visions of the Future: Almanacs, Time and Cultural Change, 1775–1870
(Oxford, 1996), ch. 3.

24.
[Henry Andrews],
Vox Stellarum: or, A Loyal Almanack … 1777
(London, 1777), p. 9.

25.
RSC, reel 98, box C, file 7/9. For Andrews, see RSC, reel 91, Almanac Statements 1800, as well as
ODNB
. For Thomas Wright, see [Henry Andrews],
Vox Stellarum, or, A Loyal Almanack … 1789
(London, 1789), p. 6; Perkins,
Visions of the Future
, p. 94;
Notes and Queries
, 7th series, vol. 3 (1887), pp. 164–5; Hone,
Year Book
, cols 1368–9.

26.
Charles Knight, quoted in Blagden, “Thomas Carnan,” p. 39.

27.
RSC, reel 99, box D, file 7/1.

28.
RSC, reel 85, Disbursements 1777–8.

29.
Matilda, or The Efforts of Virtue
, quoted in Markman Ellis,
The Politics of Sensibility: Race, Gender and Commerce in the Sentimental Novel
(Cambridge, 1996), p. 5. See also G.J. Barker-Benfield,
The Culture of Sensibility: Sex and Society in Eighteenth-Century Britain
(Chicago, 1992); Paul Goring,
The Rhetoric of Sensibility in Eighteenth-Century Culture
(Cambridge, 2005).

30.
Margaret Anne Doody, “The Gnostic Clarissa,” in David Blewett, ed.,
Passion and Virtue: Essays on the Novels of Samuel Richardson
(Toronto, 2001), pp. 210–45.

31.
Henry Brooke,
The Fool of Quality; or, The History of Henry, Earl of Moreland
(2nd ed., 4 vols, 1767), vol. 1, pp. 81–2; Ellis,
Politics of Sensibility
, ch. 4.

32.
Henry Brooke,
The History of Henry Earl of Moreland
, [ed. John Wesley] (2 vols, London, 1781), vol. 1, pp. iv–vi; also, Nehemiah Curnock,
The Journals of John Wesley
(9 vols, 1909–16), vol. 6, p. 30 n. 2.

33.
William Duff,
An Essay on Original Genius
(London, 1767), p. 143.

34.
James Macpherson,
Fingal: An Ancient Epic Poem
(London, 1762), p. 68. For the impact of Ossian on Scottish identity, see William Ferguson,
The Identity of the Scottish Nation: An Historic Quest
(Edinburgh, 1999), ch. 11.

35.
[Oliver Goldsmith],
The Mystery Revealed; Containing a Series of Transactions and Authentic Testimonials, Respecting the Supposed Cock-Lane Ghost; Which Have hitherto Been Concealed from the Public
(London, 1762), pp. 1, 3–4; E.J. Clery,
The Rise of Supernatural Fiction, 1762–1800
(Cambridge, 1995), ch. 1; Douglas Grant,
The Cock Lane Ghost
(London, 1965); Sasha Handley,
Visions of an Unseen World: Ghost Beliefs and Ghost Stories in Eighteenth-Century England
(London, 2007), pp. 141–8;
ODNB
, “Parsons, Elizabeth.”

36.
Jonathan Barry, “Public Infidelity and Private Belief? The Discourse of Spirits in Enlightenment Bristol,” in Owen Davies and Willem de Blécourt, eds,
Beyond the Witch Trials: Witchcraft and Magic in Enlightenment Europe
(Manchester, 2004), pp. 117–43; Jonathan Barry, “Piety and the Patient: Medicine and Religion in Eighteenth Century Bristol,” in Roy Porter, ed.,
Patients and Practitioners: Lay Perceptions of Medicine in Pre-Industrial Society
(Cambridge, 1985), pp. 159–62; Henry Durbin,
A Narrative of Some Extraordinary Things That Happened to Mr. Richard Giles's Children, at the Lamb, without Lawford's Gate, Bristol; Supposed to Be the Effect of Witchcraft
(Bristol, 1800).

37.
Walpole to George Montagu, 29 Jan. 1762, in W.S. Lewis, ed.,
The Yale Edition of Horace Walpole's Correspondence
(48 vols, 1937–83), vol. 10, pp. 5–7.

38.
Horace Walpole,
The Castle of Otranto: A Gothic Story
, ed. E.J. Clery (Oxford, 1996), p. 6.

39.
Ibid.
, p. 10.

40.
Barbara A. Murray,
Restoration Shakespeare: Viewing the Voice
(Cranbury, N.J., 2001), pp. 50–63.

41.
Winton Dean and John Merrill Knapp, eds,
Handel's Operas
(2 vols, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2006); Reinhard Strom,
Essays on Handel and Italian Opera
(Cambridge, 1985), pp. 74, 263–4; David J. Buch,
Magic Flutes and Enchanted Forests: The Supernatural in Eighteenth-Century Musical Theatre
(Chicago, 2008), pp. 158–66.

42.
“On the Pleasure Derived from Objects of Terror; with Sir Bertrand, A Fragment,” in J. and A.L. Aikin,
Miscellaneous Pieces, in Prose
(London, 1773), p. 125.

43.
Clery,
Rise of Supernatural Fiction
, ch. 6. Almost all English women in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were unable to sign their names. By 1750, women were about 20 percentage points behind men in literacy; by 1840, this had narrowed to 16 points: David Vincent,
Literacy and Popular Culture: England, 1750–1914
(Cambridge, 1989), p. 24. Men, however, remained the principal consumers of novels in the English provinces: see Jan S. Fergus,
Provincial Readers in Eighteenth-Century England
(Oxford, 2006).

44.
On Ann Radcliffe, see Richard Miles,
Anne Radcliffe: The Great Enchantress
(Manchester, 1995); Rictor Norton,
Mistress of Udolpho: The Life of Ann Radcliffe
(London, 1999), esp. pp. 67–70; Terry Castle, “The Spectralization of the Other in Mysteries of Udolpho,” in her
The Female Thermometer: 18th-Century Culture and the Invention of the Uncanny
(Oxford, 1999), pp. 120–39.

45.
Quoted in Norton,
Mistress of Udolpho
, p. 198; see also Clery,
Rise of Supernatural Fiction
, ch. 7.

46.
For a sceptical assessment of Beckford's interest in magic, see Boyd Alexander,
England's Wealthiest Son: A Study of William Beckford
(London, 1962), p. 82. The splendid exhibition catalogue edited by Derek E. Ostergard,
William Beckford, 1760–1844: An Eye for the Magnificent
(New Haven, 2001), more or less avoids the subject. The biographical details here are taken from these works as well as from Lewis Melville,
The Life and Letters of William Beckford of Fonthill
(London, 1910), and the biography in
ODNB
.

47.
William Beckford,
Vathek
, ed. Roger Lonsdale (Oxford, 1983), pp. 36, 113.

48.
Melville,
Life of Beckford
, p. 19.

49.
The Valuable Library of Books, in Fonthill Abbey. A Catalogue of the Magnificent, Rare, and Valuable Library (of 20,000 Volumes)
([London], [1823]), lots 3557, 3609, 3640. No books on astrology or ritual magic were sold at the auction.

50.
[Margaret Baron-Wilson],
The Life and Correspondence of M.G. Lewis
(2 vols, London, 1839), vol. 1, ch. 3; also, Elizabeth R. Napier,
The Failure of Gothic: Problems of Disjunction in an Eighteenth-Century Literary Form
(Cambridge, 1987); Michael Gamer,
Romanticism and the Gothic: Genre, Reception and Canon Formation
(Cambridge, 2000), pp. 73–89; David Lorne Macdonald,
Monk Lewis: A Critical Biography
(Toronto, 2000).

51.
Matthew Lewis,
The Monk
, ed. Emma McEvoy (Oxford, 1995), pp. 275–7.

52.
Matthew Lewis,
The Castle Spectre: A Drama
(London, 1798), “To the Reader,” p. 102.

53.
Henry Ridgely Evans,
History of Conjuring and Magic
(revised ed., Kenton, Ohio, 1930), pp. 42–4.

54.
Philip Breslaw,
Breslaw's Last Legacy; or, The Magical Companion
(London, 1784), pp. x, 101.

55.
Malcolm Macleod,
The Key to Knowledge; or Universal Conjuror
(London, 1800), p. iv.

56.
Malcolm Macleod,
Macleod's History of Witches, &c. The Majesty of Darkness Discovered: in a Series of Tremendous Tales
(London, 1793), pp. 88–97.

57.
Evans,
History of Conjuring
, pp. 53–6; Richard D. Altick,
The Shows of London
(Cambridge, Mass., 1978), pp. 84–5;
Guide to Health, Beauty, Riches and Honour
, pp. 59–61.

58.
Ralph G. Allen, “The Stage Spectacles of Philip James de Loutherbourg,” Yale School of Drama, D.F.A. thesis, 1960, pp. 67–79, 80–8; Christopher Baugh,
Garrick and Loutherbourg
(Cambridge and Alexandria, Va., 1990), pp. 97–115; David Worrall,
Theatrical Revolution: Drama, Censorship and Romantic Period Subcultures, 1773–1832
(Oxford, 2006), ch. 4.

59.
“At the large house, fronting Leicester-Street, Leicester-Square, This present THURSDAY, January 31, 1782, will be Exhibited for the first time, EIDOPHUSIKON …” (handbill, London, 1782); “At the Large House, fronting Leicester-Street, Leicester-Square, On every MONDAY, WEDNESDAY, AND FRIDAY EVENINGS, will be exhibited ('till further Notice), EIDOPHUSIKON …” (handbill, London, 1782); Altick,
Shows of London
, pp. 117–27.

60.
Clery,
Rise of Supernatural Fiction
, p. 146; Altick,
Shows of London
, pp. 217–18; Mervyn Heard,
Phantasmagoria: The Secret Life of the Magic Lantern
(Hastings, 2006), chs 3–7.

61.
Allen, “Stage Spectacles,” pp. 264–302; Kathleen Wilson,
The Island Race: Englishness, Empire and Gender in the Eighteenth Century
(London and New York, 2003), pp. 63–70; Harriet Guest, “Ornament and Use: Mai and Cook in London,” in Kathleen Wilson, ed.,
A New Imperial History: Culture, Identity and Modernity in Britain and the Empire, 1660–1840
(Cambridge, 2004), pp. 317–44; Daniel O'Quinn,
Staging Governance: Theatrical Imperialism in London, 1770–1800
(Baltimore, 2005), ch. 2.

62.
Conyers Middleton,
A Free Inquiry into the Miraculous Powers, Which Are Supposed to Have Subsisted in the Christian Church, from the Earliest Ages through Several Successive Centuries
(London, 1749); David Hume,
Essays and Treatises on Several Subjects
(4 vols, London and Edinburgh, 1760), vol. 3: “An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding,” pp. 167–202. As Jane Shaw points out in
Miracles in Enlightenment England
(New Haven, 2006), pp. 160–1, 175, these were relatively late contributions to a long-running debate.

63.
See David Hempton,
Methodism: Empire of the Spirit
(New Haven, Conn., 2005).

64.
Jean Orcibal, “The Theological Originality of John Wesley and Continental Spirituality,” in Rupert Davies and Gordon Rupp, eds,
A History of the Methodist Church in Great Britain
(4 vols, London, 1965–88), vol. 1, pp. 83–111; John Wesley,
A Second Letter to the Author of the Enthusiasm of Methodists and Papists Compar'd
(London, 1751), in Gerald R. Cragg, ed.,
The Works of John Wesley: Volume 2: The Appeals to Men of Reason and Religion and Certain Related Open Letters
(Oxford, 1975), p. 416.

65.
David Hempton,
The Religion of the People: Methodism and Popular Religion, c. 1750–1900
(London, 1996).

66.
James Lackington,
Memoirs of the First Forty-Five Years of the Life of James Lackington
(rev. ed., London, 1794), p. 294. Earlier versions of Lackington's autobiography do not contain these remarks.

67.
Ibid.
, p. 305; John Wesley,
Primitive Physic: or, An Easy and Natural Method, of Curing Most Diseases
(20th ed., London, 1780); Antoine-Joseph Pernety,
The History of a Voyage to the Malouine (or Falklands) Islands, Made in 1763 and 1764, under the Command of M. de Bougainville
(London, 1771), pp. 153–62.

68.
Curnock, ed.,
Journals of John Wesley
, vol. 5, pp. 265–75; James Boswell,
Life of Johnson
, ed. George Birkbeck Hill (2 vols, London, 1904), vol. 2, pp. 224–5, 296; Handley,
Visions of an Unseen World
, pp. 148–53.

69.
A Narrative of the Extraordinary Case of Geo, Lukins, of Yatton, Somerset, Who Was Possessed of Evil Spirits, for Near Eighteen Years
(Bristol, 1788); Owen Davies,
Witchcraft, Magic and Culture, 1736–1951
(Manchester, 1999), pp. 20–2; and for the Methodist view of spirit possession, Clarke Garrett,
Spirit Possession and Popular Religion: From the Camisards to the Shakers
(Baltimore and London, 1987), ch. 4.

70.
Narrative of the Extraordinary Case
, p. 5; Joseph Easterbrook,
An Appeal to the Public Respecting George Lukins, (Called the Yatton Demoniac,) Containing an Account of his Affliction and Deliverance
(Bristol, 1788), p. 4.

71.
Samuel Norman,
Authentic Anecdotes of George Lukins, the Yatton Demoniac; with a View of the Controversy, and a Full Refutation of the Imposture
(Bristol, 1788), p. 44.

72.
For the history of Shakerism around Manchester between 1758 and 1774, see Garrett,
Spirit Possession
, chs 5–8. B.J. Gibbons,
Gender in Mystical and Occult Thought: Behmenism and its Development in England
(Cambridge, 1995), pp. 158–62, argues for the influence of “popular Behmenism” on the Shakers, which is not impossible given the location of their early community.

73.
Jacob Boehme,
The Works of Jacob Behmen, the Teutonic Theosopher
(2 vols, London, 1764), vol. 1, pp. vii–ix; Jacob Boehme,
Forty Questions of the Soul
, trans. John Sparrow (London, 1661), sigs A
₅
–A
₉
. The phrase “from that which we find in others” replaced the original words “from that which we find in the Experimental
Physicians, Philosophers, Astronomers
.” Clearly, the eighteenth-century editors of Boehme were less concerned than Sparrow to identify a scientific attitude that could be harmonized with magic through Theosophy.