ad an influence on the imagination; Jamblicus
that they rendered them more worthy of the inspiration of the Deity.

FOOTNOTES:

[16] The responses here were delivered by a young priestess called
Pythia or Phoebas, placed on a tripos, or stool with three feet, called
also cortina, from the skin of the serpent Python with which it was
covered, it is uncertain after what manner these oracles were delivered,
though Cicero supposes the Pythoness was inspired, or rather intoxicated
by certain vapours which ascended from the cave. Some say that the
Pythoness being once debauched, the oracles were afterwards delivered by
an old woman in the dress of a young maid.

[17] This answer of the oracle brings to our recollection the equally
remarkable injunction of a modern seer to Sir William Windham, which is
related in the memoirs of Bishop Newton. "In his younger years, when Sir
William was abroad upon his travels, and was at Venice, there was a
noted fortune-teller, to whom great numbers resorted, and he among the
rest; and the fortune-teller told him, that he must beware of a white
horse. After his return to England, as he was walking by Charing-Cross,
he saw a crowd of people coming out and going in to a house, and
inquired what was the meaning of it, was informed that Duncan Campbell,
the dumb fortune-teller lived there. His curiosity also led him in, and
Duncan Campbell likewise told him that he must beware of a white horse.
It was somewhat extraordinary that two fortune-tellers, one at Venice
and the other in London, without any communication, and at some distance
of time, should both happen to hit upon the same thing, and to give the
very same warning. Some years afterwards, when he was taken up in 1715,
and committed to the Tower upon suspicion of treasonable practices,
which never appeared, his friends said to him that his fortune wan now
fulfilled, the Hanover House was the white horse whereof he was
admonished to beware. But some time after this, he had a fall from a
white horse, and received a blow by which he lost the sight of one of
his eyes."

[18] "When we come to consult thee," says he to Apollo, "if thou seest
what is in the womb of futurity, why dost thou use expressions which
will not be understood? If thou dost, thou takest pleasure in abusing
us: if thou dost not, be informed of us, and learn to speak more
clearly. I tell thee, that if thou intendest an equivoque, the Greek
word whereby thou affirmest th