Others to dinner stay, and are full fed;
The oldest man but sups, and goes to bed.
Hard is his lot who lingers out the day;
Who goes the soonest has the least to pay."
Edw. Hawkins.
THROWING OLD SHOES FOR LUCK.
(Vol. ii., p. 196.; Vol. v., p. 143.; Vol. vii., p. 182.)
Some light may perhaps be thrown on this mysterious custom by the following quotation from the Réfutation des Opinions de Jean Wier, by Bodin, the celebrated French jurisconsult, and author of the Demonomanie des Sorciers (Paris, 1586), to the quarto edition of which the Réfutation is generally found attached. It may be necessary to observe, for the benefit of those unacquainted with demoniacal lore, that Wier, though a pupil of Cornelius Agrippa, and what would be now-a-days termed exceedingly superstitious, was far in advance of his age, and the first to assert that some, at least, of the many persons who were then burned for sorcery were merely hypochondriacs and lunatics,—fitter subjects for the care of the physician than the brand of the executioner. This heterodox opinion brought upon him a crowd of antagonistic replies, and amongst them the Réfutation of Bodin. During a cursory examination of Wier's voluminous demonological works (De Lamiis Liber; Item de Commentatiis Jejuniis; De Præstigiis Demonum, et Incantationibus ac Veneficiis: Basil, 1583), I have not met with the passage underneath referred to by Bodin; but, no doubt, if time permitted, a closer search would discover it:
"Il se mocque aussi d'une Sorciere, à qui Sathan commanda de garder bien ses vieux souliers, pour un preservatif, et contre-charme contre les autre Sorciers. Je dy que ce conseil de Sathan a double sens, les souliers signifient les pechez, comme estas tousiours trainnez par les ordures. Et quand Dieu dist à Moyse et à Josué, oste tes souliers, ce lieu est pur, et sainct: il entendoit, comme dict Philon Hebrieu, qu'il faut bien nettoyer son ame de peches, pour contempler et louer Dieu. Mais pour converser avec Sathan, il faut estre souillé, et plongé en perpetuelle impietez et mechancetez: alors Sathan assistera à ses bons serviteurs. Et quand aux sens literal, nous avons dict que Sathan fait ce qu'il peut, pour destourner les hommes de la fiance de Dieu aux creatures, qui est la vraye definition de l'idolatrie, que les Theologiens ont baillie: tellement que qui croira, que ses vieux souliers, ou les bilets, et autres babioles qu'il porte, le peut garder de mal, il est perpetuelle idolatrie."