*So an apparition of a woman greater than ordinary, beckoned to Julius Caesar to pass over the Rubicon, L. Flor. lib. 4. Satyres appeared to Alexander when he besieged Tyrus; Alexander asked the divines, what was the signification of it; they told him the meaning is plain, {Greek Text: Sa Turos} (i.e.) Tyre is thine. Alexander took the town. Q. Curtius.
Near the same place, a party of the Protestants had been surprized sleeping by the Popish Irish, were it not for several wrens that just wakened them by dancing and pecking on the drums as the enemy were approaching. For this reason the wild Irish mortally hate these birds, to this day, calling them the Devil's servants, and killing them wherever they catch them; they teach their Children to thrust them full of thorns: you will see sometimes on holidays, a whole parish running like mad men from hedge to hedge a wren-hunting.
Anno 1679. After the discovery of the Popish plot, the penal laws were put in execution against the Roman Catholics; so that, if they did not receive the sacrament according to the church of England, in their parish church, they were to be severely proceeded against according to law: Mr. Ployden, to avoid the penalty, went to his parish church at Lasham, near Alton, in Hampshire: when Mr. Laurence (the minister) had put the chalice into Mr. Ployden's hand, the cup of it (wherein the wine was) fell off. 'Tis true, it was out of order before; and he had a tremor in his hand. The communion was stopt by this accident. This was attested to me by two neighbouring ministers, as also by several gentlemen of the neighbourhood.
When King James II. first entered Dublin, after his arrival from France, 1689, one of the gentlemen that bore the mace before him, stumbled without any rub in his way, or other visible occasion. The mace fell out of his hands, and the little cross upon the crown thereof stuck fast between two stones in the street. This is very well known all over Ireland, and did much trouble King James himself, with many of his chief attendants.
The first Moors that were expelled Spain, were in number five thousand five hundred and fifty-five. They sailed from Denia, October 2, 1609. H. Bleda. "Expulsion de Moriscos", p. 1000.
DREAMS.
{Greek Text: —'Onar kai Dios esi}. Homer Iliad A.
DREAMS PROCEED FROM JOVE.
HE that has a mind to read of dreams, may peruse Cicero "de Divinatione", Hier. Cardani "Somniorum Synesiorum", lib. 4, and Moldinarius "de Insomniis", &c. I shall here mention but little out of them, my purpose being chiefly to set down some remarkable and divine dreams of some that I have had the honour to be intimately acquainted with, persons worthy of belief.
Cicero "de Divinatione", lib. 1. "Hannibalem, Caslius scribit, cum Columnam auream, quae esset in fano Junonis Laciniae, auferre vellet, dubitaretque utrum ea solida esset, an extrinsecus inaurata, perterebravisse; cumque solidam invenisset, statuissetque tollere: secundum quietem visam esse ei Junonem praedicere, ne id faceret; minarique, si id fecisset se curaturam, ut eum quoque oculum, quo bene videret, amitteret; idque ab homine acuto non esse neglectum; itaque ex eo auro quod exterebratum esset, buculam curasse faciendum, & eam in summa columna collocavisse."