That the newspapers were early used for the purpose of giving contradictions by means of advertisement, or effecting sly puffs, is shown by the following, which was doubtless intended to call attention to the work, and which was published in the form of an ordinary paragraph in the Modern Intelligence, April 15-22, 1647:—
There came forth a book this day relating how a divil did appear in the house or yard of Mr Young, mercer in Lombard St., with a great many particulars there related; It is desired by the gentleman of that house, and those of his family, that all that are credulous of those things (which few wise are), may be assured that its all fabulous, and that there was never any such thing. It is true there is a dog, and that dog hath a chain, and the gentleman’s son played upon an instrument of music for his recreation,—but these are to be seen, which a spirit sure never was.
There is a logical deduction about the conclusion of this which it is to be hoped forced itself upon the minds of those who were ready to believe not only in the existence but in the visibility of spirits; and if the paragraph was but a lift for the book after all, it surely deserved success, if only for the quaint way in which it admits to the dog and the boy and the musical instrument, a combination equal upon an emergency to the simulation of a very powerful devil. In the very next edition of the same paper we come upon a paragraph which is even more direct in its advertising properties, which, in fact, might have been dictated by editorial “friendship” in these days, instead of in the first half of the seventeenth century. It runs thus:—
You should have had a notable oration made by the Bishop of Angoulesme and Grand Almoner to his Majesty of England, at a Convention in Paris in favour of the Catholicks in England and Ireland, but being overlarge it will be made public the beginning of next week by itself it is worth reading especially by those who are for a generall toleration when they may clearly see it is the broad way to the destruction of these kingdommes.