Quote:
Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth
Are you asserting that because it's possible to turn a Brownie hostile you should pick a fight with the currently non-hostile Brownie? That sounds like the kind of thing that invites becoming a cautionary tale...
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Pick a fight with? No. But it does indicate that having a Brownie in your home is not something you should rationally
want.
Which could lead to an interesting example of a clash of Enlightenment thinking with ancient practical understanding of magic. Imagine a young intelligent and highly educated person in 1750, living in, say, London, contemptuous of old superstitions (and possibly of the Church), who discovers that a house he is thinking of buying has a Brownie associated with it. He's fascinated and wants to understand it and communicate with it.
His friend who doesn't share 'rationalist' attitudes, and who was raised to take the supernatural seriously and knows the old stories well from his grandparents, thinks the rational response is to get away from anything to do with the place, double-sharpish. Don't investigate, don't try to communicate, all that does is invite in more trouble including possibly stuff you can't possible cope with. Get away before it gets its hooks into you.
The interesting thing is that they are both behaving 'rationally'...but in terms of different and conflicting assumptions. The can both be wrong, but they cannot both be right.