Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

A friend told me lately, that in a cold winter a year or two ago, as he was riding over the moors near Bridgewater, in Somersetshire, he saw a great number of geese dead upon the moors ; and upon enquiring into the cause of it, he was informed that it was the custom of […]

In the animal kingdom birds have come in for a full share of legendary lore. Thus the owl has given rise to widespread superstitions, and has ever been considered a bird of ill-omen, and its unexpected appearance a portent of death and disaster. Even whole nations have been influenced by this belief; Rome twice underwent […]

I was extremely entertained and delighted with the copy of that antient and venerable manuscript concerning Free-Masonry with which you first obliged the publick in your September magazine, and which is since unartfully printed in various shapes. The brotherhood were so well pleased with it that there was not a Magazine to be got in […]

I have found it a popular notion among that class of people to whom we are most indebted for the preservation of much interesting folklore country cottagers that the peculiar scent of the hawthorn is ” exactly like the smell of the Great Plague of London.” This belief may have been traditionally held during the […]

Sir David Dalrymple, in his ” Annals of Scotland,” lately published, thinks it improbable, because inconsistent with the religious rigour of the times, that Margery, daughter of King Robert the First, in 1316, should take the diversion of hunting on a Shrove Tuesday. But Shrove Tuesday, as soon as the Shrift, or confession at Mattins, […]

We all know the general custom, practice, or superstition, if you please, of interring the dead on the South side of our churches, in preference to the North side ; so much so, that this latter place is never dug open but to throw therein poor unfortunate strangers who may happen to die in the […]

A Charm, or Protection, found in a Linen Purse of Jackson, the Murderer and Smuggler, who died (a Roman Catholic) in Chichester Goal. ” Sancti tres Reges “Gaspar, Melchior, Balthasar, ” Orate pro nobis nunc et in bora ” Mortis nostre. ” Ces billets ont touche aux trois testes de S. S. Roys a Cologne. […]

Dining lately with a friend, our conviviality was suddenly interrupted by the discovery of a maiden lady, who observed that our party consisted of thirteen. Her fears, however, were not without hope, till she found, after a very particular enquiry, that none of her married friends were likely to make any addition to the number. […]

The following is a very remarkable vision of a Highland Seer, who is famous among the Mountains, and known by the Name of Second-Sighted Sawney. Had he been able to write, we might probably have seen this Vision sooner in print ; for it happen’d to him very early in the late hard winter ; […]

In Dunsford’s ” Memoirs of Tiverton” (4to, Exeter, 1790, p. 285, note 50), is the following very extraordinary tale : ” Many attempts have been made by poor workmen, who frequently left their daily employ, to discover money supposed to be hid near this chapel, without success; it was therefore proposed, that some person should […]