Daily Dose

From The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, by Edward Gibbon

FEAR

"Fear has been the original parent of superstition, and every new calamity urges trembling mortals to deprecate the wrath of their invisible enemies."

From Book One, Chapter XI

Daily Dose

From The Dunciad, by Alexander Pope

SEE

"How little, see! that portion of the ball,
Where faint at best the beams of science fall!"

From Book the Third

Daily Dose

From The War with Hannibal, by Livy, translated by Aubrey de Selincourt

ABOUT

"About this time a sudden wave of superstition swept over Rome."

From Book XXIX {9}

Daily Dose

From Guy Mannering, by Walter Scott

MARVELLOUS

"But it often happens, such is our natural love of the marvellous, that we willingly contribute our own efforts to beguile our better judgement."

From Chapter IV

Daily Dose

From Kim, by Rudyard Kipling

IT IS

"It is an awful thing still to dread the magic that you contemptuously investigate -- to collect folk-lore for the Royal Society with a lively belief in all Powers of Darkness."

From Chapter 10

Daily Dose

From The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, by Jacob Burckhardt

ASTROLOGERS

"Now and then, when the stars send them too cruel a message, they manage to brace themselves up, act for themselves, and say boldly: 'Vir sapiens dominabitur astris' -- the wise man is master of the stars -- and then again relapse into the old delusion."

From Influence of Ancient Superstition