‘I see,’ saith Scott, ‘a ruddy-complexioned wench, in a red waistcoat, drawing a can of beer.’
‘She will be your wife,’ cried Hodges.
‘You are mistaken, sir,’ rejoined Scott. ‘So soon as I come to London, I am engaged to marry a tall gentlewoman in the Old Bailey.’
‘You will marry the red gentlewoman,’ replied Hodges, with an air of imperturbable assurance.
On returning to London, Scott, to his great astonishment, found that his tall gentlewoman had jilted him, and taken to herself another husband. Two years afterwards, in the course of a Kentish journey, he refreshed himself at an inn in Canterbury; fell in love with its ruddy-complexioned barmaid; and, when he married her, remembered her red waistcoat, her avocation, and Mr. Hodges ‘his crystal.’
An amusing story is told of this man Hodges.
A neighbour of his, who had lost his horse, recovered the animal by acting upon the astrologer’s advice. Some years afterwards he unluckily conceived the idea of playing upon the wise man a practical joke, and obtained the co-operation of one of his friends. He had certainly recovered his horse, he said, in the way Hodges had shown him, but it was purely a chance, and would not happen again. ‘So come, let us play him a trick. I will leave some boy or other at the town’s end with my horse, and we will then call on Hodges and put him to the test.’
This was done, and Hodges said it was true the horse was lost, and would never be recovered.
‘I thought what fine skill you had,’ laughed the gentleman; ‘my horse is walking in a lane at the town’s end.’
Whereupon Hodges, with an oath, as was his evil habit, asserted that the horse was gone, and that his owner would never see him again. Ridiculing the wise man without mercy, the gentleman departed, and hastened to the town’s end, and there, at the appointed place, the boy lay stretched upon the ground, fast asleep, with the bridle round his arm, but the horse was gone!
Back to Hodges hurried the chap-fallen squire, ashamed of his incredulity, and eagerly seeking assistance. But no; the conjurer swore freely—‘Be gone—be gone about your business; go and look for your horse.’ He went and he looked, east and west, and north and south, but his horse saw never more.
Let us next hear what Lilly has to tell us of Dr. Napper, the parson of Great Lindford, in Buckinghamshire, the advowson of which parish belonged to him. He sprang from a good old stock, according to the witness of King James himself. For when his brother, Robert Napper, an opulent Turkey merchant, was to be made a baronet in James’s reign, some dispute arose whether he could prove himself a gentleman for three or more descents. ‘By my soul,’ exclaimed the King, ‘I will certify for Napper, that he is of above three hundred years’ standing in his family; all of them, by my soul, gentlemen!’ The parson was legitimately and truly master of arts; his claim to the title of doctor, however, seems to have been dubious. Miscarrying one day in the pulpit, he never after ventured into it, but all his lifetime kept in his house some excellent scholar to officiate for him, allowing him a good salary. Lilly speaks highly of his sanctity of life and knowledge of medicine, and avers that he cured the falling sickness by constellated rings, and other diseases by amulets.
The parents of a maid who suffered severely from the falling sickness applied to him, on one occasion, for a cure. He fashioned for her a constellated ring, upon wearing of which she completely recovered. Her parents chanced to make known the cure to some scrupulous divines, who immediately protested that it was done by enchantment. ‘Cast away the ring,’ they said; ‘it’s diabolical! God cannot bless you, if you do not cast it away.’ The ring was thrown into a well, and the maid was again afflicted with her epilepsy, enduring the old pain and misery for a weary time. At last the parents caused the well to be emptied, and regained the ring, which the maid again made use of, and recovered from her fits. Thus things went on for a year or two, until the Puritan divines, hearing that she had resumed the ring, insisted with her parents until they threw the ring away altogether; whereupon the fits returned with such violence that they betook themselves to the doctor, told their story, acknowledged their fault, and once more besought his assistance. But he could not be persuaded to render it, observing that those who despised God’s mercies were not capable or not worthy of enjoying them.
We do not dismiss this story as entirely apocryphal, knowing that, in the cure or mitigation of nervous diseases, the imagination exercises a wonderful influence. There are well-authenticated instances of ‘faith healing’ not a whit less extraordinary than this case described by Lilly of the maiden and the ring. It would be trivial, perhaps, to hint that a good many maidens have been cured of some, at least, of their ailments by a ring.
In 1646 Lilly printed a collection of prophecies, with the explanation and verification of ‘Aquila; or, The White King’s Prophecy,’ as also the nativities of Archbishop Laud and the Earl of Strafford, and a learned speech, which the latter intended to have spoken on the scaffold. In the following year he completed his ‘Introduction unto Astrology,’ or ‘Christian Astrology,’ and was summoned, along with John Booker, to the head-quarters of Fairfax, at Windsor. They were conveyed thither in great pomp and circumstance, with a coach and four horses, welcomed in hearty fashion, and feasted in a garden where General Fairfax lodged. In the course of their interview with the general he said to them:
‘That God had blessed the army with many signal victories, and yet their work was not finished. He hoped God would go along with them until His work was done. They sought not themselves, but the welfare and tranquillity of the good people and whole nation; and, for that end, were resolved to sacrifice both their lives and their own fortunes. As for the art that Lilly and Booker studied, he hoped it was lawful and agreeable to God’s Word: he himself understood it not, but doubted not they both feared God, and therefore had a good opinion of them both.’
Lilly replied:
‘My lord, I am glad to see you here at this time. Certainly, both the people of God, and all others of this nation, are very sensible of God’s mercy, love, and favour unto them, in directing the Parliament to nominate and elect you General of their armies, a person so religious, so valiant.
‘The several unexpected victories obtained under your Excellency’s conduct will eternize the same unto all posterity.
‘We are confident of God’s going along with you and your army until the great work, for which He ordained you both, is fully perfected, which we hope will be the conquering and subversion of your and the Parliament’s enemies; and then a quiet settlement and firm peace over all the nation unto God’s glory, and full satisfaction of tender consciences.
‘Sir, as for ourselves, we trust in God; and, as Christians, we believe in Him. We do not study any art but what is lawful and consonant to the Scriptures, Fathers, and antiquity, which we humbly desire you to believe.’
They afterwards paid a visit to Hugh Peters, the famous Puritan ecclesiastic, who had lodgings in the Castle. They found him reading ‘an idle pamphlet,’ which he had received from London that morning. ‘Lilly, thou art herein,’ he exclaimed. ‘Are not you there also?’ ‘Yes, that I am,’ he answered.
The stanza relating to Lilly ran as follows:
‘From th’ oracles of the Sibyls so silly,
The curst predictions of William Lilly,
And Dr. Sibbald’s Shoe-Lane Philly,
Good Lord, deliver me.’
After much conference with Hugh Peters, and some private discourse betwixt the two ‘not to be divulged,’ they parted, and Master Lilly returned to London.
In