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Magic Thread
Soak a piece of thread in a solution of salt or alum (of course, your audience must not know you have done this). When dry, borrow a very light ring and fix it to the thread. Apply the thread to the flame of a candle; it will burn to ashes, but will still support the ring. Magicians owe a debt of gratitude to a man named Reginald Scott. Now you have to look at Mr. Scott‘s contribution in a certain way to see this. He wrote a book in 1584 titled The Discoveries of Witchcraft. From Mr. Scott’s point-of-view, he was no doubt debunking witches as fake, but his assertion that witches used illusions to make their spells look supernatural, really serviced to help separate the idea of stage magic from supernatural magic. Witches get burnt at the stake; stage magicians don’t.
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