Books of Secrets - A Paper Read Before the Bibliographical Society, April 21, 1913 #268886

The self-assigned task of all the writers was to record astonishing and unusual events, signs and wonders in the heavens above and in the earth and sea below, portents, the birth and prophesyings of monsters, and such like. The writers did not seek to verify their reports, or, if they ran counter to ordinary experience and observation, to criticize them, but set them down for what they were worth, to be accepted or rejected. Such collections, if we may judge by their number and variety, were popular and must have supplied what was required, strange and startling narratives, true or not did not matter, just as one accepts an impossible romance now for the passive excitement it affords.