SOURCE: Krysmanski, Bernd. “We See a Ghost: Hogarth's Satire on Methodists and Connoisseurs.” Art Bulletin 80, no. 2 (June 1998): 292-310.

In the following essay, Krysmanski examines Hogarth's Credulity, Superstition, and Fanaticism, the published version of the earlier Enthusiasm Delineated, which was not only a sharper satire than the reworked version, but a more mature and coherent work as well.

I have seen Hogarth's print of the Ghost. It is a horrid composition of lewd Obscenity & blasphemous prophaneness for which I detest the artist & and have lost all esteem for the man. The best is, that the worst parts of it have a good chance of not being understood by the people.

—Bishop William Warburton, 1762¹

William Hogarth's “print of the Ghost” is his engraving Credulity, Superstition, and Fanaticism: A Medley (1762),² which, as a satire on Methodist “enthusiasts,” is indeed “horrid” in its vicious attack on a fanatic preacher and swooning congregation...