f all works of art, as of
knives, boats, looking-glasses; and that, as any of these things perish,
their souls go into another world, which is inhabited by the ghosts of
men and women. For this reason they always place by the corpse of their
dead friend a bow and arrows, that he may make use of the souls of them
in the other world, as he did of their wooden bodies in this. How absurd
soever such an opinion as this may appear, our European philosophers have
maintained several notions altogether as improbable. Some of Plato's
followers, in particular, when they talk of the world of ideas, entertain
us with substances and beings no less extravagant and chimerical. Many
Aristotelians have likewise spoken as unintelligibly of their substantial
forms. I shall only instance Albertus Magnus, who, in his dissertation
upon the loadstone, observing that fire will destroy its magnetic
virtues, tells us that he took particular notice of one as it lay glowing
amidst a heap of burning coals, and that he perceived a certain blue
vapour to arise from it, which he believed might be the substantial form
that is, in our West Indian phrase, the soul of the loadstone.

There is a tradition among the Americans that one of their countrymen
descended in a vision to the great repository of souls, or, as we call it
here, to the other world; and that upon his return he gave his friends a
distinct account of everything he saw among those regions of the dead. A
friend of mine, whom I have formerly mentioned, prevailed upon one of the
interpreters of the Indian kings to inquire of them, if possible, what
tradition they have among them of this matter: which, as well as he could
learn by those many questions which he asked them at several times, was
in substance as follows:

The visionary, whose name was Marraton, after having travelled for a long
space under a hollow mountain, arrived at length on the confines of this
world of spirits, but could not enter it by reason of a thick forest,
made up of bushes, brambles, and pointed thorns, so perplexed and
interwoven with one another that it was impossible to find a passage
through it. Whilst he was looking about for some track or pathway that
might be worn in any part of it, he saw a huge lion couched under the
side of it, who kept his eye upon him in the same posture as when he
watches for his prey. The Indian immediately started back, whilst the
lion rose with a spring, and leaped towards him.