the Hocus-Pocus Tricks, and Juggling and Painting will not colour this part of the Story. And I should wonder at Mr. Webster, if he did not afford so many ocacsions of wondring at him, when he passed this so slightly over saying, p. 15. 5. as to the changing Water into Blood, and the producing of Frogs, they were so easie to be done after the same manner, viz. by Wiars and Juggling, that they need not any particular explication, for by this the manner of their performance may most easily be understood. How shall one deal with these Men, and what will not their confidence affirm?
Fifthly, 'Tis very strange also how those Jugglers should know what signs Moses and Aaron would shew, and accordingly furnished themselves with counterfeit Serpents, Blood and Frogs against the time; or had they those always in their Pockets? If not, it was great luck for them that Moses and Aaron should shew those very Miracles first, that they were provided to imitate.
Sixthly and Lastly. If the Magicians did all this by Tricks and Juggling, may not one fear what Opinion these Men have of the same things done by Moses and Aaron? These indeed out-did the others in divers following Instances, but may not they say, that that was by their having more Cunning and Dexterity in the Art of Juggling? If they or their Proselytes have a mind to say thus, they may by their Principles, which will serve them to elude the History, in reference to Moses and Aaron, as well as it doth in relation to the Magicians. They may with as much modesty turn all into Allegory and Metaphor.
I think by all this appears, that this shift of the Witch-Advocates is very vain, and that what the Magicians did, was not mere Juggling, much less only Politick Oratory and Rhetorick. As if those Magicians by their Eloquence could persuade Pharoah and his Servants against their Senses, as these Patrons of Witches endeavour to do by us they being the greatest Witches in their own sense that are extent, and some of them are belyed, if they are not so in other senses.
