Show WHY of superstitions by H KINQ THREE LAMPS apo HAVE three lamps no moreno more no 1 less s lighted at the same time in a room la Is accounted a bad omen by many thousands of people the genealogy of this superstition Is defective some of the links of descent appear to have been lost in the course of the long ages or at least the researches of the writer have failed to discover them but the tact fact thit that by many people the three lighted lamps are considered a death jompp ji gives ves ug us at least a clue to the origin of the superstition and connects it with two ancient beliefs first there Is a suggestion of the lights which at certain dates were lighted by the ancients to guide back to their former dwellings the souls of the departed a custom which Is krnc ticen today by many savage tribes and remnants of which are still to be found in continental europe secondly in three lamps no more no less we get a hint of the perl peri palette philosophy which governed the schools as late as the elizabethan era this philosophy assigned to man three souls the vegetable the animal anil and the rational 1 I scorn him with my three souls says ben jonson jenson in tin Poe tats and in twelfth night shakespeare makes sir toby belch say shall wo we rouse the night with a catch that shall draw throe three souls ow out of one weaver it may well be that the underlying idea of 0 the superstition Is that three lighted lamps draw back the soul of some dead member of the family and in superstitious lore returns of disembodied spirits are always looked upon with apprehension Q by mcclure newspaper Synill catt |