1. Glanvill, Joseph, Saducismus Triumphatus: Or, Full and Plain Evidence Concerning Witches and Apparitions (London: J. Collins, 1681), 2: 64.Google Scholar Ventriloquism's history has been told primarily by practitioners. By far the best example of that genre is Vox, Valentine, I Can See Your Lips Moving: The History and Art of Ventriloquism (North Hollywood: Plato Publishing, 1993).Google Scholar Ventriloquists also receive some notice in Hillel Schwartz's encyclopedic pastiche of twins and simulations. See Schwartz, Hillel, The Culture of the Copy: Striking Likenesses, Unreasonable Facsimiles (New York: Zone Books, 1996), 132–37.Google Scholar Other-wise the scholarship is dominated by critical theorists, who, interested in the polyphony of discrepant “voices” within texts and in the problem of authorial voice, have taken up ventriloquism as a trope. See, for example, Patterson, Annabel, “‘They Say’ or We Say: Protest and Ventriloquism in Early Modern England,” in Historical Criticism and the Challenge of Theory, ed. Smarr, Janet Levarie (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1993), 145–66;Google ScholarGoldblatt, David, “Ventriloquism: Ecstatic Exchange and the History of Artwork,” Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 51 (1993): 389–98;CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Looby, Christopher, Voicing America: Language, Literary Form, and the Origins of the United States (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996), 165–74.Google Scholar

2. For an especially evocative treatment of rational recreations and illusionist demonstrations in early modern Europe, see Stafford, Barbara Maria, Artful Science: Enlightenment Entertainment and the Eclipse of Visual Education (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1994).Google Scholar For other important treatments of the magical exhibitionism of the Enlightenment, see Darnton, Robert, Mesmerism and the End of the Enlightenment in France (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1968), esp. 27–33;Google Scholarde Francesco, Grete, The Power of the Charlatan, trans. Beard, Miriam (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1939), 229–49;Google ScholarAltick, Richard D., The Shows of London (Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1978), 3–4, 64–76, 81;Google ScholarCook, James W. Jr, “From the Age of Reason to the Age of Barnum: The Great Automaton Chess-Player and the Emergence of Victorian Cultural Illusionism,” Winterthur Portfolio 30 (Winter 1995): 231–57.Google Scholar

3. Barnum, P. T., The Humbugs of the World (New York: Carleton, 1866), 294.Google Scholar For representative works in the rich tradition of skeptical magic, see Houdini, Harry, A Magician among the Spirits (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1924);Google ScholarMulholland, John, Beware Familiar Spirits (New York: Scribner's, 1938);Google ScholarRandi, James, Conjuring (New York: St. Martin's, 1992).Google Scholar The Enlightenment side of the magical tradition, along with that of the stage, has generally been bracketed out by American historians of religion and magic. For an overview of occultist practices in early America, see Butler, Jon, Awash in a Sea of Faith Christianizing the American People (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1990), esp. 67–97. The controversy over the links between Renaissance Hermeticism and natural philosophy on the European side has generated a considerable literature.Google Scholar See, for example, Yates, Frances A., Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1964);Google ScholarVickers, Brian, ed., Occult and Scientific Mentalities in the Renaissance (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984);CrossRefGoogle ScholarWebster, Charles, From Paracelsus to Newton: Magic and the Making of Modern Science (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982).Google Scholar

4. On the history of the Enlightenment construction of “religion,” see Harrison, Peter, “Religion” and the Religions in the English Enlightenment (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990);CrossRefGoogle ScholarByrne, Peter, Natural Religion and the Nature of Religion: The Legacy of Deism (London: Routledge, 1989);Google ScholarPreus, J. Samuel, Explaining Religion: Criticism and Theory from Bodin to Freud (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987);Google ScholarManuel, Frank E., The Eighteenth Century Confronts the Gods (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1959);Google ScholarHeyd, Michael, “Be Sober and Reasonable”: The Critique of Enthusiasm in the Seventeenth and Early Eighteenth Centuries (Leiden: Brill, 1995);Google ScholarChampion, J. A. I., The Pillars of Priestcraft Shaken: The Church of England and Its Enemies, 1660–1730 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992).Google Scholar

5. On modern ocularcentrism, see especially Jay, Martin, Downcast Eyes: The Denigration of Vision in Twentieth-Century French Thought (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993);Google ScholarLevin, David Michael, ed., Modernity and the Hegemony of Vision (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993).Google Scholar For the most sustained theorizing of the sensorium and sound, though presented within the near universal framework of the triumph of visuality, see Ong, Walter J., The Presence of the Word: Some Prolegomena for Cultural and Religious History (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1967).Google Scholar On religious orality, especially preaching, see the work of Stout, Harry S., particularly “Religion, Communications, and the Ideological Origins of the American Revolution,” William and Mary Quarterly 34 (1977): 519–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6. Paine, Thomas, “The Age of Reason,” in The Complete Writings of Thomas Paine, ed. Foner, Philip S. (New York: Citadel, 1945), 1: 596;Google ScholarAllen, Ethan, Reason the Only Oracle of Man, ed. Pell, John (New York: Scholars' Facsimiles and Reprints, 1940), 231. I present the religious dimensions of this piety, along with other aspects of the Enlightenment critique, in a book-in-progress on “Hearing Voices.”Google Scholar

7. Scot, Reginald, The Discoverie of Witchcraft (1584; reprint, London: Rowan and Littlefleld, 1973), 101. The early modern vocabulary for soothsaying and divination was very rich; other terms used for one given to prophetic, demonic, or ventriloquial speech included ob, python or pythonist, engastrimyth, and gastriloquist.Google Scholar See Blount, Thomas, Glossographia: Or, a Dictionary, Interpreting all such Hard Words, Whether Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Italian, Spanish, French, Teutonick, Belgick, British or Saxon, as Are Now Used in Our Refined English Tongue (London: Newcomb, 1656) as well as the pertinent entries in the Oxford English Dictionary.Google Scholar

8. For background on the problems the Witch of Endor created for Christian commentaries, see Flint, Valerie I. J., The Rise of Magic in Early Medieval Europe (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), esp. 18–21, 54–56;Google ScholarThorndike, Lynn, A History of Magic and Experimental Science (New York: Columbia University Press, 1923), 1: 352, 448, 470–71.Google Scholar

9. Scot, , Discoverie, 114, 121;Google ScholarGlanvill, , Saducismus, 2: 64.Google Scholar

10. On possession as “sacred theater,” see Garrett, Clarke, Spirit Possession and Popular Religion: From the Camisards to the Shakers (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987), esp. 4–6, 86–87.Google Scholar

11. For these well-known and oft-scrutinized cases, see Hall, David D., edv Witch-Hunting in Seventeenth-Century New England: A Documentary History, 1638–1692 (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1991), 149, 202, 207–211 (see as well the voices in the case of Eunice Cole, 225–29);Google Scholar Increase Mather, , An Essay for the Recording of Illustrious Providences (Boston: n.p., 1684), 140.Google Scholar For English examples, see Ewen, C. L'Estrange, Witchcraft and Demonianism (London: Heath Cranton, 1933), 148–49, 336, 452.Google Scholar For a recent interpretation that insightfully highlights the vocality of possession, see Kamensky, Jane, Governing the Tongue: The Politics of Speech in Early New England (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997), 150–79.Google Scholar

12. Ady, Thomas, A Perfect Discovery of Witches (London: Brome, 1661), 78.Google Scholar

13. Hobbes, Thomas, “Leviathan, or the Matter, Form, and Power of a Commonwealth Ecclesiastical and Civil,” in The English Works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury (London: Bohn, 1839–1845), 3: 434;Google ScholarHutchinson, Francis, An Historical Essay Concerning Witchcraft (London: Knaplock, 1718), 8–9.Google Scholar See also Hobbes, , “Elements of Philosophy,” in Works, 1: 498;Google ScholarWebster, John, The Displaying of Supposed Witchcraft (London: J. M., 1677), 165–66Google Scholar

14. Blount, , Glossographia, s.v. “ventriloquist”;Google ScholarWesley, John, “Letter to the Author of ‘The Enthusiasm of Methodists and Papists Compared,’” in The Works of the Rev. John Wesley, A.M. (London: Wesleyan Conference, 1872), 9: 7;Google ScholarManship, Andrew, Thirteen Years' Experience in the Itinerancy (Philadelphia: Higgins and Perkinpine, 1856), 50;Google ScholarSwayze, William, Narrative of William Swayze, Minister of the Gospel (Cincinnati: Methodist Book Room, 1839), 81–82;Google ScholarQuitman, Frederick H., A Treatise on Magic, Or, on the Intercourse between Spirits and Men (Albany: Balance, 1810), 45–48;Google ScholarScott, Robert, Letters to the Rev. Frederick H. Quitman, Occasioned by His Late Treatise on Magic (Poughkeepsie: Adams, 1810), 26–29.Google Scholar

15. For the author' s notation on La Chapelle in Wieland, see Brown, Charles Brockden, Wieland; or, The Transformation and Memoirs of Carwin, the Biloquist, ed. Elliot, Emory (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994), 181 n–182 n.Google Scholar For the 1799 pamphlet (not available through the Charles Evans imprints, but preserved at the New Jersey Historical Society), see Amusement-Hall: Or, A Collection of Diverting Stories and Extraordinary Facts, with an Account of the Art of Ventriloquism; and Other Entertaining Matter (Morristown, N.J.: n.p., 1799), 10–19.Google Scholar For the influence on Salverte, see Salverte, Eusebe, The Occult Sciences: The Philosophy of Magic, Prodigies and Apparent Miracles, trans. Thomson, Anthony Todd (London: Bentley, 1846), 1:157–62, 283–84. La Chapelle hitherto has not been written into the history of the naturalistic study of religion alongside other Enlightenment speculators such as Trenchard, Hume, and Fontenelle.Google Scholar

16. After ventriloquism became popular on stage, various others followed up La Chapelle's treatise with their own investigations of the acoustics and anatomy of the art. See, for example, Gough, John, “Facts and Observations to Explain the Curious Phenomenon of Ventriloquism,” Journal of Natural Philosophy, Chemistry, and the Arts 2 (06 1802): 122–29;Google ScholarLespagnol, F. M. S., Dissertation sur I'engastrimisme (Paris: Didot Jeune, 1811);Google ScholarRicherand, Anthelme, Elements of Physiology, trans. De Lys, G. J. M. (Philadelphia: Dobson, 1813), 506–507;Google Scholar“Voice,” Boston Medical Intelligencer 22 July 1823, 39;Google Scholar“Ventriloquism,” Boston Medical Intelligencer, 31 August 1824, 67;Google ScholarGood, John Mason, The Book of Nature (1826; reprint, Hartford: Belknap and Hamersley, 1845), 257–62;Google ScholarSutton, George Smith, A Treatise on Ventriloquism with Extracts from the Opinions of Several Authors Respecting that Extraordinary Gift of Human Faculty (New Haven: n.p., 1833).Google Scholar

17. Chapelle, Joannes Baptista de la, Le Ventriloque, ou l'engastrimythe (Paris: Duchesne, 1772), 341, 471–78.Google Scholar

18. Chapelle, La, Le Ventriloque, xxi, 323–60, 419–22, 438–39.Google Scholar

19. Reid, Thomas, “Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man,” in The Works of Thomas Reid (Charlestown, Mass.: Etheridge, 1813), 2: 83, 309, 322.Google Scholar

20. Reid, Works, 2: 319–20;Google ScholarEncyclopædia Britannica; Or, A Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and Miscellaneous Literature (Philadelphia: Dobson, 1798), 18: 639–41;Google ScholarStewart, Dugald, “Philosophy of the Human Mind,” in The Works of Dugald Stewart (Cambridge: Hilliard and Brown, 1829), 3: 168–69.Google Scholar

21. Stewart, Works, 1:108, 137–51. For an excellent overview of American Protestant indebtedness to the Scottish Enlightenment, see Noll, Mark A., “The Rise and Long Life of the Protestant Enlightenment in America,” in Knowledge and Belief in America: Enlightenment Traditions and Modern Religious Thought, ed. Shea, William M. and Huff, Peter A. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 88–124.Google Scholar I have also suggested the impact of the Scottish Enlightenment on popular piety in Holy Fairs: Scottish Communions and American Revivals in the Early Modern Period (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989), esp.170–83.Google Scholar

22. Stewart, , Works, 3:166–71;Google ScholarBrewster, David, Letters on Natural Magic (London: John Murray, 1842), 171–72. There were at least seven American editions of Brewster's Letters between 1832 and 1845. For the point that the illusion was less about acoustics than the misdirection of the imagination Stewart was drawing especially on an anonymous review of John Gough's research in Edinburgh Review 2 (April 1803): 192–96.Google ScholarSee also Gough, “Facts and Observations.”Google Scholar

23. Brown, , Wieland, 32, 69–70, 152, 165.Google ScholarWieland is among the most widely commented upon novels of the early national era, but scholars have been imprecise in contextualizing the book's central illusionist practice of ventriloquism and the religious meanings that flow from it. For a basic contextualization of this dimension of the novel, see “Historical Essay,” in Brown, Charles Brockden, The Novels and Related Works of Charles Brockden Brown, ed. Krause, Sydney J., Reid, S. W., and Cowie, Alexander (Kent State: Kent State University Press, 1977), 1: 325–26.Google Scholar Readings that I have found especially insightful for my purposes include: Fliegelman, Jay, Prodigals and Pilgrims: The American Revolution against Patriarchal Authority, 1750–1800 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1982), 235–48;Google ScholarButler, , Awash, 225–28;Google ScholarWatts, Steven, The Romance of Real Life: Charles Brockden Brown and the Origins of American Culture (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994), esp. 54–58, 82–89, 184–85;Google ScholarRosenthal, Bernard, “The Voices of Wieland,” in Critical Essays on Charles Brockden Brown, ed. Rosenthal, Bernard (Boston: G. K. Hall, 1981), 104–125. Rosenthal and Watts both do an especially fine job of locating the novel within Brown's wider deistic suspicions about revealed religion.Google Scholar

24. Brown, , Wieland, 194, 234.Google Scholar

25. Brown, , Wieland, 163, 243.Google Scholar On the religious hothouse, see especially Hatch, Nathan O., The Democratization of American Christianity (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989);Google Scholar Butler, Awash; Wood, Gordon S., “Evangelical America and Early Mormonism,” New York History 61 (1980): 359–86.Google Scholar

26. Brewster, , Letters, 5, 176–78;Google ScholarStewart, , Works, 3: 171–73;Google ScholarStewart, Dugald, “Observations on Ventriloquism,” Edinburgh Journal of Science 9 (1828): 250–52.Google Scholar For the original account, see Lyon, George Francis, The Private Journal of Captain G. F. Lyon of H.M.S. Hecla, during the Recent Voyage of Discovery under Captain Parry (London: Murray, 1825), 149–50, 359–74.Google Scholar

27. Bogoras, Waldemar, The Chukchee, vol. 7 of Memoirs of the American Museum of Natural History (Leiden: Brill, 1904–1909), 435–39.Google ScholarSee also Sutton, , Treatise, 26–29;Google ScholarKane, Elisha Kent, Arctic Explorations in the Years 1853, 54, 55 (Philadelphia: Childs and Peterson, 1856),2: 126–27;Google ScholarAdams, W. H. Davenport, Curiosities of Superstition, and Sketches of Some Unrevealed Religions (London: Masters, 1882), 274–78.Google Scholar

28. Ventriloquism Explained: And Juggler's Tricks, or Legerdemain Exposed: With Remarks on Vulgar Superstitions (Amherst: J. S. and C. Adams, 1834), unpaginated preface, x, 1, 39–40, 56, 77–78, 82–83, 114–15;Google Scholar“Blitz and the Darkies,” Flag of the Union, 1 02 1851, reprinted in Everybody a Ventriloquist: A History of Ventriloquism, with Instructions and Anecdotes Combined (Philadelphia: Brown's, 1856), 24–25.Google Scholar On Potter's racial identity (he is said to have passed as “an East Indian,” which would have been useful for selling his magic, and to have carefully concealed his own background), see Eastman, John R., History of the Town of Andover, New Hampshire, 1751–1906 (Concord, N.H.: Rumford, 1910), 1: 425–27;Google ScholarPecor, Charles Joseph, The Magician on the American Stage, 1752–1874 (Washington, D.C.: Emerson and West, 1977), 69–71. When one ventriloquist advertised a special show in 1802 for black Philadelphians, he was forced to cancel the performance.Google ScholarSee Pecor, , Magician, 88–89.Google Scholar

29. See Everybody a Ventriloquist; Ventriloquism Made Easy, Also an Exposure of Magic (Philadelphia: Wyman the Wizard, 1860);Google ScholarKirbye, George W., Origin and History of Ventriloquism; with Full and Comprehensive Instruction in the Art (Philadelphia: Brinckloe, 1861);Google Scholar[Hurst, Thomas D.], The Practical Magician, and Ventriloquist's Guide (New York: Hurst, 1876);Google Scholar and Kennedy, Harry, How to Become a Ventriloquist (New York: Tousey, 1891).Google Scholar

30. Garnault, Paul, History of Ventriloquism, trans. Helm, George Havelock (Brooklyn: n.p., [1900?]), 8, 41–42.Google Scholar

31. Bacon, Francis, The Works of Francis Bacon, ed. Spedding, James, Ellis, Robert, and Heath, Douglas (London: Longman, 1859), 3: 156, 162, 164.Google Scholar

32. Breslaw's Last Legacy; Or, the Magical Companion, 5th ed. (London: Lane, 1791), viii–ix;Google ScholarBeckmann, John, A History of Inventions and Discoveries, trans. Johnston, William (London: Longman, 1817), 3: 269–70.Google ScholarSee also Hooper, William, Rational Recreations in which the Principles of Numbers and Natural Philosophy Are Clearly and Copiously Elucidated, 4 vols. (London: Davis, 1784);Google ScholarAstley, Philip, Natural Magic: Or, Physical Amusements Revealed (London: n.p., 1785);Google ScholarPinetti, Guiseppe, Physical Amusements and Diverting Experiments (London: n.p., 1784);Google Scholar[Decremps, Henri], The Conjurer Unmasked; Being a Clear and Full Explanation of all the Surprizing Performances Exhibited as well in this Kingdom as on the Continent, trans. Denton, Thomas (London: Stalker, 1788).Google Scholar

33. Paine, , Complete Writings, 1: 508.Google Scholar For the ghost shows, see Barber, X. Theodore, “Phantasmagorical Wonders: The Magic Lantern Ghost Show in Nineteenth-Century America,” Film History 3 (1989): 73–86 (playbill on p. 79);Google ScholarBarber, Xenophon Theodore, “Evenings of Wonders: A History of the Magic Lantern in America,” 2 vols. (Ph.D. diss., New York University, 1993);Google ScholarPecor, , Magician, 85–86, 104–112;Google ScholarBarnouw, Erik, The Magician and the Cinema (New York: Oxford University Press, 1981), 19–34;Google ScholarCastle, Terry, “Phantasmagoria: Spectral Technology and the Metaphorics of Modern Reverie,” Critical Inquiry 15 (autumn 1988): 26–61;CrossRefGoogle ScholarAltick, , Shows, 117, 217–20;Google ScholarIsherwood, Robert M., Farce and Fantasy: Popular Entertainment in Eighteenth-Century Paris (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986), 50–52, 199–201.Google Scholar For Robertson's own account, see Robertson, Étienne Gaspard, Métnoires recreatifs scientifiques et anecdotiques (Paris: n.p., 1831), 1: 272–310. Like ventriloquism, the phantasmagoria were also incorporated into the natural history of superstition.Google ScholarSee Salverte, , Occult Sciences, 1: 265–92;Google ScholarBrewster, , Letters, 5–6, 57–85.Google Scholar

34. Vox, , History and Art, 41–48;Google ScholarIsherwood, , Farce, 197–98;Google ScholarAltick, , Shows, 36.Google Scholar

35. Good, Book of Nature, 262;Google ScholarBurke, Edmund, A Philosophical Inquiry into the Origins of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, ed. Phillips, Adam (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), 75–78.Google Scholar On puppets and witchcraft, see Shershow, Scott Cutler, Puppets and “Popular” Culture (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1995), 34–37.Google Scholar Vattemare is the only one of these performers to have been studied in detail. See Dargent, J. L., Alexandre Vattemare: Artiste, promoteur des echanges internationaux de publications (Brussels: n.p., 1973).Google Scholar

36. “Ventriloquism,” Boston Medical Intelligencer, 67. The best study of stage magic in North America for this period is Pecor's Magician on the American Stage. Pecor tracks the travels, shows, and venues of various magicians, including several of the early ventriloquists (such as Rannie and Porter) and documents the development of magic as professional theater. I am indebted to his work for substantiating the geographic range of these itinerant performers.Google Scholar See also Moulton, H. J., Houdini's History of Magic in Boston, 1792–1915 (Glenwood, Ill.: Meyerbooks, 1983), 1–44.Google Scholar

37. Columbian Centinel, 14 July 1804, 3.Google Scholar See also [Rannie, John], The European Ventriloquist's Exhibition (Portsmouth: S. Whidden, [1808]).Google Scholar For Rannie's shows within the wider theatrical history of the period, see Grimsted, David, Melodrama Unveiled: American Theater and Culture, 1800–1850 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968), 100–101;Google ScholarOdell, George C. D., Annals of the New York Stage (New York: Columbia University Press, 1927), 2: 143–44, 209–210, 344.Google Scholar

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41. Moss, Jesse Jasper, “Autobiography,” typescript, The Disciples of Christ Historical Society, Nashville. I am indebted to Elizabeth Kronzek for bringing this memoir to my attention.Google Scholar

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46. Reid, , Works, 2: 114, 320, 338–44, 357, 360;Google ScholarBrigham, Amariah, Observations on the Influence of Religion upon the Health and Physical Welfare of Mankind (Boston: Marsh, Capen, and Lyon, 1835).CrossRefGoogle ScholarOn earlier efforts to medicalize enthusiasm, see especially Heyd, , “Be Sober and Reasonable.”Google Scholar On the larger translation of religious idioms into psychological ones, see, for example, Hacking, Ian, Rewriting the Soul: Multiple Personality and the Sciences of Memory (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1995), esp. 142–58.Google Scholar

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48. Tylor, Edward B., Primitive Culture: Researches into the Development of Mythology, Philosophy, Religion, Language, Art and Custom (New York: Holt, 1889), 2: 132–34, 182.Google ScholarOn ventriloquism's thriving as a commercial entertainment, see Vox, , History and Art, esp. 90–133.Google Scholar

49. Blazek, Robert E., Using Ventriloquism in Christian Education (Littleton, Colo.: Maher, 1976), 5–6, 32.Google Scholar See also Boley, Bill, The Gospel Ventriloquist Five Gospel Ventriloquist Routines (Hopkinsville, Ky.: Boley, 1986);Google ScholarAndersen, William H., 111 Ways to Use Ventriloquism in Church Work (Littleton, Colo.: Maher, 1986);Google ScholarMurphy, Cullen, ‘“Hey, Let Me Outta Here!”’ Atlantic Monthly 264 (08 1989): 62–71.Google Scholar On the larger issue of commodification and Christian amusements, see Moore, R. Laurence, Selling God: American Religion in the Marketplace of Culture (New York: Oxford University Press, 1994).Google Scholar