Abracadabra
Abracadabr
Abracadab
Abracada
and so on, till there remained only the initial A. His word was taken, and this use of the charm was popular even in the Spectator's time. It is described by Defoe in his
History of the Plague.
The number Four was called Tetractys by the Pythagoreans, who accounted it the most powerful of numbers, because it was the foundation of them all, and as a square it signified solidity. They said it was at the source of Nature, four elements, four seasons, &c., to which later speculators added the four rivers of Paradise, four evangelists, and association of the number four with God, whose name was a mystical Tetra grammaton, Jod, He, Vau, He.
Where it is explained that Adam meaning Man; Seth, placed; and Enosh, Misery: the mystic inference is that Man was placed in Misery.