pages: practicalmagicia00harr.pdf, 81
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practicalmagicia00harr.pdf | 81 | THE PRACTICAL MAGICIAN. 71 heard to speak when the first rays of the worshipped sun glanced on its impassive features. The magic words were undoubtedly pronounced by the attendant priest, for we find a similar trick prevalent throughout the whole history of ventriloquism, and even now the public professors of the art know how much dc- pends on fixing the attention of their audience on the object or placc from whence the sound is supposed to proceed. The Jews carried the art with them into Palestine, for we tracce the agency throughout their history. The Grecks practised a mode of divination termed gastromancy, where the diviner replied without moving his lips, so that the consulter believed he heard the actual voice of a spirit speaking from its residence within the priest's belly. In the Acts of the Apostles (xvi. 16), mention is made of a young woman with a familiar spirit meeting the Apostles in the city of Philippi, in Macedonia, - St. Chrysostom and other early Fathers of the Christian Church mention divination by a familiar spirit as practised in their day. The practice of similar divina- tion is still common in the East ; it lingers on the banks of the Nile, and is even practised among the Esquimaux. This divina- tion by a familiar spirit has been practised upwards of three thousand years. MODERN PROFESSORS OF THE ART. The earliest notice of ventriloquial illusion, as carried out in modern times, has reference to Louis Brabant, valet-de-chambre of Francis I., who is said to have fallen in love with a beautiful and rich heiress, but was rejected by the parents as a low, unsuitable match. However, the father dying, he visits the widow ; and on his first appearance in the house she hears accosted in a voice resembling that of her dead husband, and which seemed to proceed from above. Give my daughter in marriage to Louis Brabant, who is a man of great fortune and excellent character. I now endure the inexpressible torments of purgatory, for having refused her to him ; obey this admonition and I shall soon bc delivered ; you will provide a worthy husband for your daugh- ter, and procure everlasting repose to the soul of your poor hus- band." The dread summons, which had no appearance of proceeding from Louis, whose countenance exhibited no change, and whose lips were close and motionless, was instantly complied with ; but the deceiver, in order to mend his finances for the accomplish- ment of the marriage contract, applies to one Cornu, an old and rich banker at Lyons, who had accumulated immense wealth by |