[The Soul]
The first therefore, lest I have not time to enter all, I shall speak of is The Soul! This seems, to me at least, a most extraordinary and incomprehensible thing. Yet from the different sources which I have received it, and the manner of relation, serves but more and more to perplex. Whether it is really and absolutely the soul, or some other principle on which the very existence depends, I cannot say. But something it is, lodged apparently in the heart or breast, that on these occasions flies off and leaves them, and at the very instant of its exit it is perceived. And [the parting] occasions such a derangement of the whole system, and particularly of the faculties, as very soon to deprive the object of life, but [primarily causes] a total want of sense, such as we suppose the soul endows us with.
[An Attempt to Capture a Soul]
I shall here relate you one of the many stories of the kind, verbatim, as I received it. It was from an Indian, of course. He told me that one summer, being on a visit rather to a distant part of the country (perhaps two or three hundred miles [distant]), he fell in with one of his acquaintances who (as often happens between strangers, particularly to such as come from the southward) asked to purchase medicines of him.
I had but a small quantity, and only of four sorts or kinds. He being very anxious for them, I sold them all to him. He was not satisfied. He must have more, though I positively assured him I had given him the last. Then he menaced me, and said I should feel the effects of his resentment arising from my avarice and uncharitable spirit. Knowing his disposition, I returned to my friends, intending to be as far out of his way as possible.
One night in the winter he conjured. I was fast asleep (and several hundred miles off) and never thought more of him. But he called upon his familiars and demanded my soul! It was taken to him. But just as it was on the eve of entering his conjuring hut, I perceived it and sprang from my bed in the most dreadful agonies and convulsions, insomuch that two men holding and pulling of me with all their might, and [who] also had the assistance of the women, could not keep me quiet. I was constantly springing forward, rushing hither and thither and absolutely (totally) deprived of my faculties, for I have not yet the least knowledge of what I was doing, so great was my horror in observing this conjuring tent.
At last a friendly spirit interfered and forbad the conjurer at his peril to do anything to my soul, but allow it to return immediately. He was afraid for his own life and durst not disobey. He let it go. I cannot tell you how happy I felt and so easy. The distance was great indeed, but I soon flew back and reentered my body, when I became entirely composed.
But I had been so dreadfully agitated that I found myself in a profuse sweat, my whole frame so shaken, debilitated, and weake, that for several days I could not move but with pain.
"Heh!" said I, "What a narrow escape!"
The other Indians asked what ailed me? I told them where I had been. They would scarcely credit [it]. But in the ensuing summer, upon enquiry, they found it true, and were now fully convinced that this power doth lodge with Indians!