In his essay on 'Superstition,' Hume writes:
'Weakness, fear, melancholy, together with ignorance, are the
true sources of superstition.' Also 'in such a state of
mind, infinite unknown evils are dreaded from unknown
agents.'
Man's impotence to resist the forces of nature, and their
terrible ability to injure him, would inspire a sense of
terror; which in turn would give rise to the twofold notion
of omnipotence and malignity. The savage of the present day
lives in perpetual fear of evil spirits; and the
superstitious dread, which I and most others have suffered,
is inherited from our savage ancestry. How much further back
we must seek it may be left to the sage philosophers of the
future.
CHAPTER VII
THE next winter we lay for a couple of months off Chinhai,
which we had stormed, blockading the mouth of the Ningpo
river. Here, I regret to think, I committed an act which has
often haunted my conscience as a crime; although I had
frequently promised the captain of a gun a glass of grog to
let me have a shot, and was mightily pleased if death and
destruction rewarded my aim.
Off Chinhai, lorchers and fast sailing junks laden with
merchandise would try to run the blockade before daylight.
