Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1880-06-24
SuDersfifiOnS.

There are men, aye,and women, toe, who
still cling with the utmost tenacity and
bull-headednesS to long exploded theo-
ries of the effects of the supernatural,
and believe implicitly as they do in
heaven that mysterious causes control
the affairs of life, despite of all educa-
tion and enlightenment and the repeated
sweeping away of these cobwebs of the
brain.
1t is common belief that the moon
exercises marked control upon vegeta-
bic matter; that those growing above
the ground must be Sowed in the light,
and those to mature beneath the soil in
the dark of the "silver orb" when in
fact the time of planting has no more to
do with successful yield than it has
with the growth of rocks. Given good
soil, proper cultivation, free from weeds
and plenty of food and they will produce
bOuntiful return despite such foun-
datiOnless superstitions, and the "old
man" the children are won't to discover
will laugh at the idea as the Veriest
mOonsinel
With sailors such things are very
common. A horseshoe must be nailed
to the heel of the foremast; ship must
never have its keel laid OF be launched
! or sail on Friday; the Sabbath is a lucky
time for leaving port; killing black cat
on board will produce terrible storms, if
not shipwreck; minister among the
passengers is bad omen; rats will
leave ship about to be lost; sharks will
follow snip if there is to be death on
board, and so on through thousand
variations.
Haunted" houses are so common as
to be scarcely worth the mentioning. EV-
cry locality has at least one, and a vii
lage lacking this exquisite topic for hair
raising gossip is to be pitieG. The old
belief that the head must lie to the east,
and the doors and windows opened for
the passage of the spirit (after leaving
the body is not altogether abolished,
and the senseless superstition that no
one can die upon feathers. certainly not
if any of them are from wild birds, has
its advocates.
Don't kill toadl 1t will make the
cows give bloody emilk,; is asserted by
many who should know better; AID yet
it would puzzle the most profound phil
OsOphers to trace the connecting link"
between the batrachian (eVen though of
the geniaes 6rJol and the bovine. If
the butter don't come easily, drop red
hot horse shoe in the churn, and sing
"burn your nose, burn your nose" and
some old witch's probosis will suffer
and your labor be made easyi Don't cut
the nails of your young child; it will
make thief of it, Don't look at the
new moon over your left shoulder; it Is
very unlucky.
To repeat even a hundredth part of
the floating superStitions would fill an
entire paper. Some people, ancient
danes especially, have "sign" for ev-
erything, or rather make of everything
"sign." Strange how the relics of
witchcraft have endured the light of
centuries; how education and science
and religion have not been able to BAN
ish them; how such intangible things as
ghosts and "spooks" and dreams infiu-
ence the lives of those who are looked
upon as sane; how age doats upon them
and children are taught
| "Under the tree,
When the fire out doors burns merrily.
There the witches are making tea"
and this, we presume, is the reason why
women find their fortunes predicted by
the grounds at the bottom of the cupl
1t is high time such nonsense was
banished, and forever. They belong to
unlettered ages, and should not be tOler-
ated in the present. The mother who
permits her child to hear such rubbish
is not fit for her place, and the nurse
who retails it ought to be sent to the pill
lory. We earnestly protest against it in
these days of higher civilization; OF
freedom from the thralldOm of darkness
that ever surrounds ignorance. Don't
let your children's minds be stained by
any such nonsense, and don't proclaim
yourself fool by advocating it.