A negro, under the infatuation of Obeah, can only be cured of his
terrors by being made a Christian: refuse him this boon, and he sinks a
martyr to imagined evils. A negro, in short, considers himself as no
longer under the influence of this sorcery when he becomes a christian.
And instances are known of negroes, who, being reduced by the fatal
influence of Obeah to the lowest state of dejection and debility, from
which there were little hopes of recovery, have been surprisingly and
rapidly restored to health and cheerfulness by being baptized
christians. The negroes believe also in apparitions, and stand in great
dread of them, conceiving that they forbode death, or some other great
evil, to those whom they visit; in short, that the spirits of the dead
come upon the earth to be revenged on those who did them evil when in
life. Thus we see, that not only from the remotest antiquity, but even
among slaves and barbarians, the belief in supernatural agencies has
been a popular creed, not, in fact, confined to any distant race or
tribe of people; and, what is still more surprising, there is a singular
and most remarkable identity in the notion or conception of their
infernal ministry.
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