Giffard and divers others who have from one to another lickt up the Vomit of the first Broacher of this vain and false opinion and without due consideration have laboured to obtrude it upon others Yet was it in a manner rejected by the most of the Learned who had duly weighed the matter and read the strong and convincing arguments of Wierus Tandlerus Nymannus Biermannus Gutierrius Mr. Scot and the like until of late years Dr. Casaubon and Mr. Glanvil have taken up Weapons to defend these false absurd impossible impious and bloody opinions withal against whose arguments we now principally direct our Pen and after the answering of their groundless and unjust scandals we shall labour to overthrow their chief Bulwarks and Fortifications CHAP. III. The denying of such a Witch as is last described in the foregoing Chapter doth not infer the denying of Angels or Spirits Apparitions no warrantable ground for a Christian to believe the Existence of Angels or Devils by but the Word of God HAving declared in what sense and acceptation we allow of Witches and in what notion we deny them lest we be misunderstood we shall add thus much That we do not as the Schools speak deny the existence of Witches absolutè simpliciter sed secundùm quid and that they do not exist tali modo that is they do not make a visible Contract with the Devil he doth not suck upon their bodies they have not carnal Copulation with him and the like recited before and in these respects and not otherwise did Wierus Gutierrius and Mr. Scot deny Witches that is that neither they nor their supposed Familiars could perform such things as are ascribed unto them And that Dr. Casaubon and Mr. Glanvil should charge those that hold this opinion with Atheisth or Sadducism is to me very strange having no ground connexion or rational consequence so to do yet doth Dr. Casaubon affirm it in these words Now one prime foundation saith he of Atheism as by many ancient and late is observed being the not believing the existence of spiritual Essences whether good or bad separate or united subordinate to God as to the supreme and original Cause of all and by consequent the denying of supernatural operations I have I confess applied my self by my examples which in this case do more than any reasoning and the Authority of the holy Scriptures laid aside are almost the only convincing proof And Mr. Glanvil is so confident I might justly say impudent that he styled his Book A Blow at modern Sadducism which I confess is so weak a blow and so blindly levell'd and so improperly directed that I am sure it will kill or hurt no body and tells us this boldly and roundly And those that dare not bluntly sâ—y There is no God content themselves for a fair step and introduction to deny there are Spirits or Witches Which sort of Iâ—fidels though they are not ordinary among the meer Vulgar yet are they numerous in a little higher rank of understandings And those that know any thing of the World know that most of the looser Gentry and the small Pretenders to Philosophy and Wit are generally deâ—iders of the belief of Witches and Apparitions And the whole design of his Book is to prove those men to be guilty of Sadducism that deny the existence of Witches understood in his sense and this we oppose and the state of the question we lye down thus That the denying the existence of Angels or Spirits or the Resurrection doth not infer the denying of the Being of God nor the denying of the existence of Witches in the sense before laid down infer the denying of Angels or Spirits and that they do unjustly charge the Authors of this opinion with Sadducism we shall prove with irrefragable Arguments 1. There can be no right deduction made nor no right consequence drawn where there is no dependency in causality nor no connexion of dependency For as in the Relative and Correlative the denying of the one necessarily destroys the other yet fundamentum Relationis non destruitur so a father without a child as a father doth neither exist nor is known and yet the foundation of those two terms of Paternity and Childship which is Man doth remain So he that denieth Creation doth destroy the Relative which is Creator yet the foundation which is God doth remain and the denying of the Creation doth not infer the necessary conclusion of denying the Being of a God because there might be a God though there were no Creation because God is supposed to be both in respect of causality and duration before Creation So what relation can Mr. Glanvil feign betwixt the Being of God and the Being of Angels or Spirits For they both belong to the Predicament of Substance and not that of Relation and there is less relation betwixt the Being of a Witch and the Being of Spirits so that the denying of the one doth not infer the denying of the other And though there were relation which Mr. Glanvil cannot shew the foundation of that Relation which is so necessary that Relatives cannot subsist without it might remain though the Relatives were taken away and therefore the denying of the existence of Angels or Spirts doth not infer the denying of the Being of God and therefore the Authors of this opinion are wrongfully and falsely charged with Atheism and the denying of the existence of a Witch in the sense specified doth not infer the denying of the Being of Spirits and therefore Scot Osburne and the like are falsely and wrongfully charged with Sadducism 2. Though it be a true Maxime that de posse ad esse non valet argumentum yet on the contrary the possibility of that can never be rationally denied that hath once been in esse But it is apparent that the Sadducees denied the Resurrection and that there were either Angels or Spirits that is they denied that Angels or Spirits whether good or bad did separately exist and that they were nothing but the good or bad motions in mens minds yet these men were no Atheists for though they denied the Resurrection and held that there were no Angels or Spirits yet they held and believed there was a God and did allow of and believed the five Books of Moses else would not our Saviour have used an argument whose only strength was drawn from a sentence in the third Chapter of Exodus the sixth verse So that even the denying of the Existence of Angels and Spirits doth not infer the denying of a God much less doth the denying the Existence of a Witch infer the denial of the Being of Angels and Spirits and therefore the charge of Atheism and Sadducism is false injurious and scandalous 3. Those things that in their Beings have no dependence one upon another the denying of the one doth not take away or deny the being of the other but where the being doth meerly exist in
dependency upon another superior Cause there take away or deny the being of the first Cause and thereby you take away and deny the being of all the rest that depends upon it So he that denies the Being of a God doth necessarily deny the Being of Angels or Spirits but not on the contrary For he that denieth the Existence of Angels and Spirits doth not therefore necessarily take away or deny the Being of a God because the Being of a God is independent of either Angel or Spirit and doth exist solely by it self And therefore if Wierus or Scot had denied the Existence of Angels and Spirits which they did not yet it would not have inferred that they were Atheists and therefore are falsely accused by Dr. Casaubon and Mr. Glanvil And though they should have denied the Existence of Witches which they did not simpliciter sed tali modo yet it would not have inferred that they were guilty of Sadducism because Spirits or Demons have their Existence without any dependence of the being of Witches and therefore it is but a poor fallacia consequentiae to say he that denies a Witch denies a Demon or Spirit 4. The denying of the Existence of Spirits doth not infer the denying of the Being of a God because in the priority of duration God was when Spirits were not for they are not immortal à parte anté So likewise the denying of the Existence of Witches doth not infer the denial of the Being of Spirits for in the priority of duration Spirits were existent before Witches for Adam and Eve could not be ignorant that there were Spirits both good and bad and yet then there were no Witches So that a Spirit having in respect of duration a Being before that a Witch can have any the denying the Existence of the latter doth not infer the denying of the Being of the former but is meerly inconsequent agreeable to no Rules of Logick except that of Logger-head Colledge 5. Many properties or proper adjuncts may be ascribed unto a substance the denying of which adjuncts doth not infer the denying of the being of the substance So that to deny that a Horse hath fins like a fish or wings like a bird doth not infer the denying of the being of a Horse Therefore it is injurious and scandalous in Dr. Casaubon and Mr. Glanvil to charge Dr. Wierus and Mr. Scot with Atheism and Sadducism when indeed as we shall prove hereafter their own Tenents tend to blasphemy impiety vanity and uncharitableness Another thing that we oppose is that Apparitions are no warrantable ground for a Christian to believe the Existence of Angels and Spirits by but the Word of God which these cogent reasons do sufficiently prove 1. For to say that the Apparitions of Spirits good or bad do prove their Existence is but petitio principii a begging of the question that first is in doubt and ought to be proved For how come we to be assured that the Apparitions that are made and really by unquestionable Witnesses attested for truth not to speak of melancholy Fancies and Fables Knacks of Knavery and Imposture and other ignorant and gross mistakes which are often believed to be Apparitions when they are no such matter that they are made by good or bad Spirits for that is the thing in doubt and so is but a circular way of arguing by way of begging the question or proving ignotum per ignotius for Apparitions do not prove the Being of Spirits except it be first proved that those Apparitions be made or caused by Spirits 2. There are many Apparitions that are produced by natural and artifi◠Causes and need not be referred to supernatural ones as are all 〈◊〉 Idola Images or Species that we see in Glasses which cannot be denied to be Apparitions and yet arise from natural Causes So the Apparition of Comets new Stars and many other sort of strange Meteors as sometimes three Suns the Rain-bow Halones and the like that have natural Causes to produce them and are no proof of the Being of Spirits Nay as the best and most credible Historians have left upon Record and hath been known to be a certain verity in divers parts of these three Kingdoms within the space of these forty years strange and various Sights have been seen in the Air both of Men and Horses and Armies fighting one with another and yet were these no proof of the Existence of Spirits because they may and doubtlesly do proceed from other causes and not from the operation or efficiency of Angels or Spirits either good or bad 3. It is not certainly known what diversity of Creatures there may be that are mediae naturae betwixt Angels and Men that may sometimes appear and then vanish so that if it be granted that there be Apparitions really and truly yet it will not necessarily follow that these are caused by good or bad Angels because they may be effected by Creatures of another and middle Nature and so Apparitions no certain ground for the believing of the Existence of Angels or Spirits For the most learned Drusius gives us this account from one of the Commentators upon the Book Aboth Debet homo intelligere ac scire à terra usque ad firmamentum quod Rakia id est Expansum appellant omnia plena esse turmis praefectis insrà plurimas esse creaturas laedentes accusantes omnésque stare ac volare in aëre neque à terra usque ad firmamentum locum esse vacuum sed omnia plena esse praepositis quorum alii ad pacem alii ad bellum alii ad bonum alii ad malum ad vitam ad mortem incitant Ob id compositum fuit canticum occursuum quod incipit Sedet in occulto Supremus And if this be a truth here are orders and numbers enough of several sorts to make Apparitions and yet be neither the good or bad Angels And if there may any credit be given to the relation that Cardan gives of his Father Facius Cardanus which he had from his own mouth and also had left it in writing then there are mortal Demons that are born and do die as men do that can appear and disappear and are of such most tenuious bodies that they can afford us neither help nor hurt excepting terrors and spectres and knowledge And if there may be credit given to Plutarch so highly magnified by Dr. Casaubon the God Pan of the Heathens must have been one of these mortal Demons because he tells us upon the credit of Epotherses a Tale of hear-say That Thamus was by a voice thrice calling upon him commanded that when he came to Palodes he should tell them that the great God Pan was dead And that there are such mortal Demons is strongly asserted by Paracelsus and by him called Nymphae Sylphi Pygmaei and Salamandrae and that they are not of Adams Generation and that they have wonderful power
tentabant dicere demonstrat Illi enim volebant ostendere quòd non propriâ virtute ejecit Daemones Ipse autem ostendit quòd non solùm Daemones sed eorum Principem ligavit quod manifestum est ab his quae fact a sunt Qualiter enim Principe non victo hi qui subjacent Daemones direpti sunt 5. Lastly he concludeth He that is not with me is against me And he that gathereth not with me scattereth abroad And it 's proverbially known saith Dr. Hammond that he that is not on ones side that brings Forces into the field and is not for a mans assistance he is certainly for his Enemy engages against him doth him hurt and consequently my casting out Devils shews that I am Satans declared Enemy By all which arguments he flatly overthrows the false supposition of the Pharisees 4. These Tenents do overthrow the chief Articles of the Christian Faith to wit the rational and infallible evidence of the Resurrection of Christ in the same individual and numerical body in which he suffered and this we shall elucidate in these particular Considerations 1. The whole strength of the Christian Religion consists in the certainty of Christs Resurrection in his true and individual body For as the Apostle argueth And if Christ be not risen then is our preaching vain and your faith is also vain yea and we are found false witnesses of God because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ whom he raised not up if so be that the dead rise not For if the dead rise not then is not Christ risen And if Christ be not risen your faith is vain ye are yet in your sins Then also they which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished If in this life only we have hope in Christ we are of all men most miserable So that all these sad consequences must needs follow and the whole Christian Religion be found a lye if Christ be not truly risen from the dead 2. And though the Apostle do enumerate sufficient Witnesses of his Resurrection and appearance after death and that he was seen of Cephas then of the Twelve after that he was seen of above five hundred Brethren at once then of James then of all the Apostles and lastly of himself Yet all this Cloud of Witnesses will prove little but dissolve into vapour if there were or are either Angels or Spirits that in their own or assumed bodies may appear in his form shape and likeness and to sight and tangibility be in all properties as his body was to have flesh and bones the print of the nails in the hands and feet and to eat and drink 3. That the Apostles held the opinion that there was Apparitions and Spirits that did shew themselves in any form or likeness is most plain and evident for when they saw Christ walking upon the Sea they supposed it had been a Spirit or Apparition for the Greek is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and cryed out That is either being cruelly affrighted and amazed their Phantasies did represent strange thoughts in their minds or else which doubtless was the truth seeing Christ walking upon the Sea which they thought was not possible for a man to do without sinking or drowning they in great fear cryed out and forgetting his former Miracles did vainly suppose it some Spirit that had made an apparition in his likeness But it is most strange that the Disciples that had seen and been eye-witnesses of so many Miracles wrought by him during his life and those that accompanied him at his death as the renting of the veil of the Temple from the top to the bottom and the Earth-quake and the renting of the Rocks and the Darkness that was over the Land from the sixth hour unto the ninth and that after his Resurrection the Graves were opened and many bodies of Saints that slept arose and came out of the Graves and went into the holy City and appeared unto many of which they could not be ignorant It is I say most wondrous strange that after all these they could doubt of the verity of his Resurrection and imagine that it was a Spirit in his form and likeness And most especially considering that his Sepulchre was made sure the stone sealed and a Watch set to attend it of which they could not be ignorant and likewise the certain affirmation and evidence of the two Maries from the mouth of the Angel and their own sight who worshipped him and held him by the feet and Peters finding the Sepulchre empty and his appearing to the two Disciples that went to Emmaus and yet for all this at his next appearance not to be satisfied but to be terrified and affrighted and to suppose they had seen a Spirit is beyond all wonder but that doubtless the heavenly Father had so ordained it in his inscrutable Wisdom that the infallible certainty of his Resurrection might be more evidently and punctually proved For at his next appearing when they were all together Jesus himself stood in the midst of them and said unto them Peace be unto you But they were terrified and affrighted and supposed they had seen a Spirit there the word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Now the cause of this supposing that they had seen a Spirit doubtless was because as St. John tells us That Jesus twice had stood in the midst of them the doors being shut because of the Jews and therefore they could not possibly imagine that he could have a body that could make penetration of dimensions not considering that he had an omnipotent Power and therefore nothing could be impossible unto him Though it may well be conceived to be done without penetration of dimensions because by his Almighty Power he might inperceptibly both open and shut the doors and so enter and suddenly stand in the midst of them and no humane sense be able to discern it But however it was the Disciples did not then believe that it was Christ with his individual body in which he suffered but either as some of the Fathers believed that it was his very Spirit that he yielded up upon the Cross that appeared in his figure or shape that was so pure fine and penetrable that it could pass through any Medium though never so dense or solid or some other Spirit that assumed his form and shape which is far more probable and sound But howsoever it was they did believe that it was some Spirit in his likeness and not he himself in that very numerical body in which he suffered as may be apparently gathered from the words of Thomas called Didymus who strongly affirmed saying Except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails and put my fingers into the print of the nails and thrust my hand into his side I will not believe 4. To the grounds of all these doubts our Saviour gives a demonstrative and infallible solution which we shall explain in
bear this signification is manifest from the things they performed for in Exodus they are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and they in like manner cast down every man his rod and they became serpents not that their rods were really transubstantiated into true serpents as Aarons was for that could not be done but by an Omnipotent and Divine power which they had not It was only done as Juglers do seemingly by sleight and cunning and so had an appearance of true serpents but were not so indeed or else in making a shew to throw down their rods they secretly conveyed them away and threw down serpents in their stead as might easily be done by sleight of hand as we shall shew more fully hereafter 5. That this is the genuine meaning of this word is manifest from the circumstances of some other places duly weighed and compared together for one text saith as our English Translators have rendered it And it came to pass when Joram saw Jehu that he said Is it peace Jehu And he answered What peace so long as the whoredoms of thy mother Jezebel and her witchcrafts are so many Now why they should translate it witchcrafts cannot well be imagined except it were to draw the Scriptures to speak according to their preconceived opinions for the word used there is the same we speak of to wit 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which though Arias Montanus rendereth veneficia ejus that according to the Latine signification is but poysonings or poyson making which doth not intimate Witchcraft in that sense that is vulgarly understood which Tremellius properly renders praestigae ejus and Luther renders it by the words Coeverye and so doth the Low-Dutch Though the proper High-Dutch word for praestigiator a Jugler be Bautâ—er which is as Calepin tells us that Praestigiae sunt incantationes delusiones cujusmodi sunt quae manuum quadam dexteritate alia apparent quam rever â sunt Now what whoredoms or fornications had Jezebel committed Spiritual whoredomes and not Carnal ones for she had her self gone a whoring after Idols and strange gods and as much as in her lay drew the people of Israel into the same whoredoms and for this it was that so fearful a judgment fell upon her And what Witchcrafts if they must be so called had she practised or followed Was it any other than in setting up maintaining and defending the Priests of Baal and of the groves who practised several sorts of divination jugling impostures and delusions whereby they were seduced and blinded to follow and worship the false god and Idols And from this it is plain that all her Witchcrafts were only impostures and delusions whereby the people were led unto idolatry and so the true signification of this word is a deceiver and an impostor and intendeth no other kind of Witchcraft at all And in the same sense must the word given by those we call the Septuagint which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pharmaca vel venena sua her poysons that is her deceits and delusions that she set up by the lying Divinations Juglings and Impostures of the Priests by which the people were seduced and blinded and poysoned with the filthy Doctrine and practice of Idol worship And in the same sense must the words be taken in the Revelation where the words 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 are used For the Text saith And a mighty Angel took up a stone like a great milstone and cast it into the sea saying Thus with violence shall that great City Babylon be thâ—wn down and shall be found no more at all And after For thy merchants were the great men of the earth For by thy sorceries were all nations deceived These words are spoken mystically of spiritual Babylon in which Antichrist ruleth who as the Apostle saith sitteth in the temple of God and exalteth himself against all that is called god and this is he whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders So that it is plain that his working being by lying wonders his Merchants must needs be lyers and deceivers and it is these Sorceries impostures and delusions by which all Nations are deceived and caused to err and so is no other Witchcraft but meer lying delusion and imposture And to this purpose doth Dr. Hammond Paraphrase it in these words speaking of the destruction of Babylon And three eminent causes he saith there are of this First Luxury which inriched so many Merchants and made them so great Secondly seducing other people to their Idolatries and abominable courses by all arts of insinuation And thirdly the persecuting and slaying of the Apostles and other Christians And in the same sense must this word also be taken in the Galathians which though translated Witchcraft must needs mean imposture deceit and delusion by which people are led from the true Doctrine and Worship of Christ to vain and lying Superstition and Idolatry and not bodily poysoning 6. Thus far we can find no such Hebrew word as signifieth any such kind of a Witch as Dr. Casaubon or Mr. Glanvill intend or labour to prove and therefore we may proceed to the next Only we cannot but take notice of one other text that our English Translators have erroneously rendered and that is this where Samuel is rebuking Saul for sparing Agag and the best of the spoil he saith For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry Which Tremellius renders thus Quin sicut peccatum divinationis est rebellio sicut superstitio Idola est repugnantia And Arias Montanus gives it thus Quia peccatum divinationis est rebellio mendacium vel Idolum Teraphim transgredi which both are agreeable to the Hebrew word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifieth properly Divination So that this place noteth not rebellion against an earthly or temporal King but against the King of Heaven and to disobey his command and to follow our own wills and judgments and to persevere therein is as odious and detestable as to set up lying Divinations thereby to follow Idols and false gods for the following the fancies of our own brains is to follow the divinations of our own counsel and to make an Idol and a Teraphim of our own frail weak and blind judgments and to forsake the pure and perfect Law of the Lord which ought to be a lantern to our feet and a light unto our paths and is spiritual rebellion even as the divinations of Idol-priests and Idol-worship were 6. The next word in this place of Deuteronomy is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 utens incantatione vel incantans incantatione aut juâ—gens junctiones from the root 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sociatus est junctus fuit alteri copulatus est for so Avenarius renders it And Schindlerus saith Incantator vel qui consortium habet cum Daemonibus conjurator qui incantationibus multa animalia in unum locum
things to come of which she was utterly ignorant so that we grant her under a spiritual league with the Devil as all wicked persons are but we deny that she had any other familiar spirit but only the spirit of delusion and Imposture as we shall make good by these arguments 1. Because the word sometimes signifieth the persons pretending to be skilful in this sort of Divinations for so the Woman saith unto Saul Behold thou knowest what Saul hath done how he hath cut off 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pythones that is the persons that pretended and practised that kind of Divination And so again in that of Isaiah And thy voice shall be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sicut Pythonis as the voice of one that useth this kind of Divination So that it is clear that the act is ascribed unto and was performed by the persons practising this couzening craft and not unto a familiar or Devil 2. Sometimes it is taken for the means that they pretended they performed it by as in Sauls deluded and despairing sense for he saith Divina quaeso mihi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in Pythone vel per Pythonem and cause to ascend whom I shall name unto thee So that he vainly thought that she could call up and make to ascend whomsoever he should name so blind and deluded was he when the spirit of the Lord was departed from him and was justly delivered up to believe lies because he had not received the love of the truth 3. It doth not appear that she had any familiar spirit or called up any for the name that is there given her is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Dominam Pythonis vel utris the Mistriss of the Bottle or of the Oracle for Saul saith seek me a Woman that is Mistriss of the Bottle or of the Oracle for so it must signifie if it be genuinely and fitly translated and his servants tell him that at Endor there is a Woman that was Mistriss of Ob the Bottle or Oracle For though some translate it mulier habens Pythonem or as Tremellius mulier praedita Pythone it will but reach thus much that she was possessed of or had in her power this Ob Bottle or Oracle that could be nothing but the fit contrived place to give answers as they did at the Oracle For if they meant that she had a familiar spirit in her Belly then it was possest of her more than she could be said to be possest of it But there is another Text that doth fully agree with this and will help to explicate it and is this speaking of the destruction of Nineveh or the Jewish Nation and the causes of it Because of the multitude of the whoredoms of the welfavoured harlot the Mistriss of Witchcrafts 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Domina vel patrona the Mistriss or Patroness of Juglings and delusions So that in propriety of language she of Endor is called the Mistriss of Python or Oracle because she could play the couzening feats that belonged unto it 4. Amongst all the several ways of Idolatry that Manasseh set up or caused to be set up this is one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fecit Pythonem or fecissetque Pythonem he made Ob or Pytho and though Translators have been much perplexed and hard put to it to give a signification agreeable to their preconceived opinion yet have they were it right or wrong brought it to their minds though it be utterly false and erroneous for Tremellius renders it instituitque Pythonem which though pretty near yet is altogether short of the propriety and the most of the rest have run quite Counter but our English Translators the worst of all others who give it and dealt with a familiar spirit When it is plain that this word must be taken in this place as it is in the third verse of this Chapter he made groves fecitque lucos because the words are both from the same root which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 fecit confecit perâ—ecit and so it is and must be taken in other places and is especially manifest in these God said to Noah make thee an Ark of Gopher wood and after a window shalt thou make to the Ark. The Psalmist saith But our God is in heaven he hath done whatsoever he pleased and again To him who alone doth great wonders We might add forty places more where the word is used that cometh from this root and hath the same punctual signification so that from hence we may conclude 1. That Manasseh could not make a Devil nor a Spirit and therefore that the word Ob doth not intend nor bear forth any such matter in true and genuine signification 2. That he could not make a Man or Woman and therefore the word properly doth signifie neither 3. That he only could make and cause to be contrived the Groves in such as order ar the Idol-Priests might direct as most fit for them to play their couzening and Jugling feats and delusions in So he might make or cause to be contrived the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or place for the Oracle and prepare those knacks and implements wherewith and in which place the Diviner might either by him or her self or with the help of confederates bring to pass strange things which they made the blind and ignorant people believe were performed by the God worshipped in and by those Idols or by Demons and Spirits or the calling up of the dead When in truth there was nothing at all performed but either in raptures feigned and forced Furies Trances and thereby lying predictions and ambiguous equivocations were uttered whereby the people were deluded and drawn unto Idolatry or by giving dark and obscure responsions by Ventriloquy speaking in Bottles or through hollow Pipes and cavities whereby they did peep and mutter or lastly by having knavish confederates hidden in secret and cunningly contrived places and suitably habited to personate those that were desired to be raised up as is most probable in this Woman of Endor and the forged and pretended Samuel So that there was no Devil nor familiar but a couzening Knave or a Quean more crafty than the Demons themselves 5. That they had no familiar Spirit is manifest if we consider the manner how they carried themselves in these cheating actions and performances for the Prophet tells us thus And when they shall say unto you seek unto 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ad Pythones unto Oraclers and unto Wizards that peep and mutter If they had a familiar Spirit or Demon what need they chirp peep or mutter could it not speak loud and plain enough Yea doubtless it could if they had any such but it is to conceal their own deceit and knavery lest it should be found forth and discovered And without such chirping and muttering they could neither perform their Jugling delusions nor keep them from being known and derided Tremellius his note upon this place is
very remarkable The Prophet saith he aggravateth the heinous crime of those Witches from the vanity of those Divinations which the very manner of them betrayeth those seducers have not so much wit that they dare speak to the people the thing they pretend to speak in plain and open terms with an audible clear voice as they that are Gods Prophets who speak the word of God as loud as may be and as plain as they can to the people but they chirp in their Bellies and very low in their Throats like Chickens half out of the shells in their hatching And this doth plainly declare their knavery and cheating Juglings The same Prophet in another place speaking of the destruction and bringing low of Jerusalem he saith And thou shalt be brought down and shalt speak out of the ground and thy speech shall be low out of the dust And thy voice shall be as of a Pythonist Ob or as of an Oracler out of the ground and thy speech shall whisper peep or chirp out of the dust The word there and in the former place used is from the root 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 garrivit more avium he hath peeped or chirped like a Bird. Now this doth plainly allude to these kind of Pythonists or Oraclers who in giving their Oracles or Divinations did speak out of the ground that was from hollow Vaults and Caves contrived on purpose for them to perform their tricks in and such a place as this called in the Hebrew Ob did Manasseh make and prepare And thy speech shall be low out of the dust like these deceivers who fall into Trances and lie upon their faces the better to conceal and hide their Impostures and so do change their voice and mutter as it were out of the dust thereby to make the people believe that it is the Demon's or Spirits voice that speaketh in them when it is nothing but their own counterfeiting And thy voice shall be like one of these Oraclers out of a low and hollow place to whisper and chirp like a Chicken coming forth of the shell the more to make them believe that it is the voice of a Spirit and not their own by craft and cunning altered and changed Upon which place learned and judicious Calvin saith thus much For the voice of them who before were so lofty and cruel he compareth to the speech of Pythonists who when they did utter the Oracles did give forth I know not what kind of murmur from some low and dark place under the earth 8. The next word that followeth in this place of Deuteronomy is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the root 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 novit sivit proprie est ut Avenarius inquit mentis intellectus Which word our Translators contrary to their usual custom have kept a constancy in and alwaies have rendered a Wizard a name as we conjecture not improper for we in the North of England call such as take upon them to foretel where things are that have been stoln or to take upon them to help Men or Goods that the vain credulity of the common people have thought to be bewitched we I say call them Wise Men or Wise Women without regard had to the way or means by which they undertook to perform these things Divers others do render it sciolus which is proper and consonant to the former The other Translations that we have either seen or were able to understand are so uncertain various wide and wilde that it were lost labour to examine or recite them and the word Wizard though a general one is the most proper that we can find But we must conclude that hitherto we find no such word as signifieth a Witch in that sense we have allowed and endeavoured to confute 9. The last word mentioned in this Text of Deuteronomy is a Necromancer or one that consulteth with the dead Now whether this were some special kind of Divination or but a comprehension of all the kinds being but in all their several sorts a leading of the people to inquire of dumb and dead Idols may be a great and material question And though no Interpreter or Commentator that we have seen read or do remember do hint at any such matter but still strike upon the common string that it should be some kind of Magick whereby they could make the dead appear and consult with them yet notwithstanding all this we cannot but propose our doubts in these reasons following 1. Moses in this Text doubtlesly did not set down all the particular sorts of Divinations and Impostures used amongst the Heathen for that had hardly been possible but the chiefest kinds of them And this is not rationally probable that he would do it by a Tautology or repetition of the same thing twice For inquiring of the dead or consulting with them was intended in the word Ob and the Woman of Endor said Whom shall I raise up or cause to ascend unto thee Whereby it appeareth that she pretended and also Saul vainly believed who said Divine unto me in or by Ob that she could cause the dead to ascend and to have answers from them of things to come as is manifest in the Story of the pretended apparition and prediction of Samuel And so this thing should be twice repeated in this place which is not probable that Moses would have done 2. He doth not forbid these several sorts of Divination only because they were evil and unlawful in themselves for some of them might be lawful and performed by natural or artificial means but because of the thing they all centred in and the end they all tended to which was to lead and draw the people to inquire of and to serve deaf dumb and dead Idols For though the Idols were Silver and Gold the work of Mens hands and had eyes and saw not ears and heard not feet and walked not mouths and spoke not neither was there breath in their Nostrils And though the common people could not but know this for as Isaiah saith they were so blinded that None considereth in his heart neither is there knowledge or understanding to say I have burnt part of it in the fire yea also I have baked bread with the coals thereof I have roasted flesh and eaten it and shall I make the residue thereof an abomination shall I fall down to the stock of a tree Yet notwithstanding were they so deluded by the crafty Impostures and subtile Divinations of all the several sorts of these Jugling Priests that they ran to ask counsel at these dead Idols who as they falsly perswaded the people did inspire them and gave them answers when the Idols were all dead things and gave no answers at all And this is that consulting with the dead that all these couzening Priests did draw the people unto and therefore in general is here forbidden 3. The words of the Prophet where he saith And when they shall
say unto you seek unto them that are Ob or Oraclers and unto wizards that peep and that mutter should not a people seek unto their God for the living to the dead do fully prove as much for the sense must be this That the people of God ought to seek unto their own God who was and is a true and a living God and to his Law Testimonies and not to those peepers and mutterers that seek counsel of the dead Idols only and doubtless this is the true meaning of consulting the dead 4. This exposition includeth no absurdity nor bringeth any inconvenience and is genuine and not wrested whereas the other doth hurry in a whole heap of most absurd doubts questions and opinions But if in this exposition we be Heterodoxal we crave pardon and referr it to the judgment of those that are learned of what perswasion soever they be 10. Another word that is used in divers places of Scripture is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which though Avenarius doth derive from 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 stilus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 claâ—sit yet the learned person Masius saith Est autem aliarum nationum vocabulum ab Hebraea lingua alienum peregrinum usurpatum tamen ab Hebraeis And also the judicious Polanus is of the same opinion that it is a word strange and foreign from the Hebrew language The Translators are all so various about the proper derivation and signification of it that it were but lost time and labour to recite them But it is manifest that it was a general word for one that was skilful in all or divers sorts of these Divinations and might best be constantly rendred magos and that for these reasons 1. It is the opinion of Masius and Mr. Ady that it is a general word and signifieth one that hath skill in many of these kind of arts if they may be so called the latter of which saith thus It is taken in the general sense for magus a Magician that hath one or all these crafts or Impostures And the former quoting the sentence of Rabbi Isaac Natar saith Hoc nomine vocatos esse ab Hebraeis quosvis qui inter gentes singularem prositebantur sapientiam praesertim cùm ea ad superstitionem pertineret 2. Because that in Exodus 7. 13. those that there are called Hachamim and Mechassephim that is sapientes praestigiatores as Tremellius renders it which is most proper and genuine are there called Hartummim Mezeraim that is Magos Aegypti the Magicians of Aegypt by which it appeareth plainly that it is a general name and may most properly be rendered a Magician 3. It may most properly be taken for a Magician because those that acted before Pharaoh are called by that name and excepting their opposing of Moses and their superstition it doth not appear that they dealt with unlawful Magick as we shall prove undeniably hereafter 11. There is also another word which is used in divers places which is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mussitavit he hath muttered or murmured and is taken generally for any kind of murmuring for any cause whatsoever as in this place But when David saw that his servants whispered And again All that hate me whisper together against me And in another place Fuderunt submissam orationem a low whispering prayer In which places it is taken for any kind of low speaking whispering or muttering Of this we may observe these things 1. Sometimes by a Metonymie it is taken for a low and modest speech the art of Oratory or Eloquence as Isaiah 3. 3. intelligentem vel peritum eloquentiae and sometime for an ear-ring inaâ—ris as in the 20. verse of the same Chapter 2. It is also ascribed unto Charmers or Inchanters as in the Psalm That doth not hearken unto the voice of the charmers Where it is plain that all Charmers were whisperers and mutterers but not on the contrary that all whisperers or mutterers are Charmers 3. And whereas our English translation readeth it Surely the serpent will bite without inchantment and a babler is no better It may as well be read as Arias Montanus translates it Si mordeat serpens in non susurro vel absque susurro If the Serpent bite without hissing or sibilation And Schindlerus to the same purpose Si mordebit serpens absque incantatione vel murmure id est sibilo And so Avenarius Si mordeat serpens absque susurratione id est absque sibilo And though Tremellius and the whole troop of Translators do render it as our English Translators do yet that will not make sense for it would inferr that as a Serpent will bite except it be charmed so will a babler do also But who ever heard of a bablers being charmed So that truly considered that cannot be the sense of the place But if it be taken exactly according to the Hebrew then the sense runs thus If the Serpent bite without or in not hissing and excellency is not to him that hath a tongue that is The Serpent doth hurt with his biting without making a noise with his tongue but a babler doth make a noise but effecteth nothing or speaketh to no purpose 4. There is another Text in Jeremy which is commonly rendered thus For behold I will send serpents cockatrices among you which will not be charmed and they shall bite you saith the Lord. But it may be as fitly read To whom there is no hissing and they shall bite you And whether way soever it be read the sense is good that is their enemies shall be so fierce and cruel that no words can stay or appease their fury or that they shall be so sly and cunning that they shall destroy you before they speak or give you warning And whether way soever it be there is a pronoun in the Hebrew which is superfluous a thing that is usual in that language 5. But if in both places it be taken for charming yet will it not prove the being and existence of such a kind of Witch as we have denied and confuted nor doth it shew any fit appellation for such a one 12. Moreover there is another word as much mistaken and as falsly translated as any of the rest and that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Inflammatus est flammescebat and is understood a shining brightness as in the Psalm Who maketh his Angels spirits his ministers flaming fire And in another place inflammabit â—os dies veniens The day cometh that shall burn as an oven From whence we may note these things 1. From this root doth come 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Flamma Metaphorically as Schindlerus saith a polished and shining piece of Metal as a Sword or the like But Avenarius tells us it is Flamma rutilans lamina fulgens vibrans as And he placed at the East of the garden of Eden Cherubims and a flaming or bright shining sword which turned every way to keep the way
uti magicis illusionibus cum potestas Philosophiae doceat operari quod sufficit Therefore are those men that came from the East to worship Christ called Magicians not because that great knowledge they had in the secrets of Nature was Diabolical or unlawful for the name of a Magician was honourable and laudable until Knaves and Impostors made use of it to cheat and couzen withal and for wicked and ungodly ends but because they had made use of it for the glory of God and the good of mankind therefore were they Magicians in the genuine and best sense as working by lawful and natural means and to a good end when the Magicians of Pharaoh may be called Cacomagicians because they used the good and excellent causes and agents of nature to a wicked and Diabolical end namely to resist the truth and so the only difference of Magick is from the end and uses and not from the causes or agents that are both natural So what these Magicians of Pharaoh did though it were strange and wonderful yet was it meerly by natural means and causes and yet being for a wicked end was therefore Diabolical So Jacob when he set the pilled rods with white streakes in them before the flocks in the gutters in the watering troughs that when the Rams and the Sheep came up to drink and coupled together they might conceive and bring forth ring streaked speckled and spotted young ones It came so to pass and is confessed by Pererius himself and the most of learned Expositors upon that place to be from natural causes and was a strange feat of natural Magick but not evil because not directed to a wicked end but that of Pharaohs though wrought likewise by a natural causes for so it was whether ascribed to the Devil that can but work by natural means or not was wicked and Diabolical because they did it to resist Moses and Aaron the messengers of the Lord Jehovah 3. The most or all the learned Expositors that have Commented upon this place of Exodus as may be seen in Dr. Willets Hexapla and divers other learned Authors though they attribute these things done by the Magicians to the power and assistance of Satan yet in the manner they do acknowledge them not to be done really and in truth but only in shew and appearance But what they mean by shew and appearance is not so easie to find out and determine for if by it they mean that they did it as Juglers and those that use the Art of Legierdemane do that is by shewing one thing and then by nimble sleight and agility convey it away and suddainly and unperceiveably substitute another thing in its place which they perform by leading the Eyes and attentions of the spectators another way with staring and using of strange and insignificant words then we should be soon accorded for so they might probably and easily have been performed as we shall prove anon but this is not the thing they mean or intend But some do mean that the Devil did only deceive the Phantasie and imagination of the beholders in causing them to imagine and believe that the rods were changed into Serpents when they were not changed at all but only their imaginations deceived in thinking them to be Serpents when they were but only rods as melancholy persons Men in Feavers Phrensies and Maniacal distempers do often think and affirm that they see strange things when they see no such things externally but the Phantasie is only deceived with the species and images of those things within This might be granted if Pharaoh and all the Spectators could be proved to be Men under those forenamed distempers and the like though yet that might and doth often come to pass from meer natural causes where the Devil hath nothing to do at all But the beholders of these actions of the Magicians are neither proved nor can rationally be supposed to be Men under any such distempers but must be understood to be Men of several constitutions tempers and of sound health and therefore not any way capable of any such illusions neither could the Devil in a moment have so vitiated their imaginations which we affirm he can no ways do except the humours fumes and spirits in the Body be first altered by natural causes which cannot be done instantaneously and if it could then it would follow that no Man could certainly tell when he were deceived in his imagination when not neither could it be as some imagine by casting a mist before their Eyes for though Christ did hold the two Disciples Eyes going from Emaus that they did not know him it were blasphemous to think that Satan could do so also And a mist casting before their Eyes might make them to see more dimly and confusedly and cause things to appear greater than they were but not to make one thing seem a quite contrary But it never was yet proved that Satan could do such a thing and what was never proved may safely and rationally be denied Some do suppose that the Devil did cloath or cover the Magicians rods with some such vestment of an airy substance as might make the rods appear to the eye like Serpents but this is as groundless a whimsey as any of the rest and as it hath no proof so it needs no confutation 4. But to come more close to the matter it is most plain and perspicuous that what they did was meerly by Art or by Art and Nature joined with it for if we may trust any thing to propriety of the words as we have proved sufficiently before they are called mechassephim praestigiatores that is Juglers such as by sleight of hand and nimble conveyance could perform strange and wonderful things and after they are called Hartummin that is Magicians such as had skill in natural things and by knowing their causes and making due and timely application of them to passives that were suitable could produce wonderful effects And if we seriously consider the few things that they performed they might easily be brought to pass by Legerdemain alone For as for holding a rod in their hands and seeming to throw it down upon the ground how soon might they throw down an artificial Serpent in its stead and immediately and unperceivedly make conveyance of the rod And if it be thought difficult or impossible I shall unriddle the mystery as I have sometimes seen it performed and is but thus The Jugler that is to perform this feat is usually provided before-hand with a wiar so twined and wrested that it may be pressed together with the little finger in the ball of the hand and when let loose it will extend it self like a spring and make a pretty motion upon a Table this is fitted with a suitable head and a piece of neatly painted linnen perfectly resembling a Serpent with Eyes and all This thus fitted he holdeth in his right hand betwixt his little finger and the
Meteors it is but only as instrumental and organical Causes working meerly as they are ordered and acted by the first cause that worketh all in all as the Christian Philosopher Doctor Fludd hath most learnedly proved in his Treatise of Cosmical Meteors which I seriously commend to those that desire full satisfaction in this particular But the Devil is chiefly called the Prince of the power of the air because he is the proud high airy and spiritual Prince and Ruler of wickedness in high or super-coelestial places by which proud airy and spiritual wickedness he worketh in the Children of disobedience For we wrestle not against flesh and blood but against principalities against powers against the rulers of the darkness of this world against spiritual wickedness in high places 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Upon which learned Beza saith thus Homine◠quorum fragilis caduca est natura cui opponuntur versutiae spirituales infinitis partibus potentiores And again I st a nomina tribuit Angelis malis propter effectus non quod eos suâ vi possint praestare sed quia illis Deus laxat habenas And therefore S. Chrysostom upon this place saith thus Mundi verò dominos eos vocat non quod mundum gubernent sed solet scriptura malos actus hunc mundum vocare ut quando Christus dicit vos non estis ex hoc mundo quemadmodum ego non sum ex mundo 2. To consider their power in spiritual and moral things particularly we shall find they have no power in some things but by their fall have utterly lost it as is apparent in these few points 1. They have lost that freedom of will that they had by Creation and were partakers of before they fell and agreeable to this is the Thesis of learned Zanchy which is this That all Devils have so far their wills made obstinate in sins the hatred of God Christ and of Mankind that from this evil they cannot will to repent and thereby be saved and this he thus proveth 1. Because in the Scriptures they are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for they are now become such that they cannot be changed from their malice and wickedness because it is become natural unto them 2. From whence it is manifest that the whole time since their fall never yet any of them hath given any sign of resipiscence 3. If they could repent and believe in Christ then for them and their sins Christ also should have died for he saith that he prayed for those that were to believe in him but they neither believe in him neither did he die for them 4. But the chief cause of their impenitency is the just judgment of God that hath given them up to hardness of heart because they sinned knowingly and wilfully against the truth And this point is sufficiently proved by Thomas Aquinas the rest of the Schoolmen and many others 2. So that as they have lost freedom of will so they cannot at all will or act to be saved or to repent 3. And as they cannot will or act to repent or be saved so the whole acts of their wills are evil malicious and wicked being liars and murtherers from the beginning 3. The third is to consider their power in sublunary and elementary things which is the most pertinent to our present purpose it being the thing that some have magnified even to a kind of omnipotency and therefore we must the more narrowly ventilate and examine it which we shall do in this order 1. How great soever the power of the faln Angels may be supposed to be yet neither in knowlege can they be deemed to be omniscient or in power to be omnipotent because they are created Beings circumscribed limited and finite and consequently can perform no act that necessarily must require an omnipotent power and so can neither create things de novo annihilate or transubstantiate any Creature or substance or pervert or put forth of order the things that God by Creation Decree and Providence hath set into their certain orders of Generation alteration and corruption 2. How great soever their power may be supposed to be yet rationally it must be taken for a truth that they have not the same power that they had before their fall For as Zanchy saith Certum est enim in universum in genere hac etiam in parte illos punitos fuisse ut non possint quicquid poterant cum boni essent nec etiam quicquid nunc velint Because the Holy Ghost beareth witness that they are bound in Chains and that Satan begged leave of God to invade Job that they fought with the good Angels but were overcome and that they may be so resisted of believing men that they may be overthrown Ac vae nobis nisi potentia Daemonum infirmata esset à Domino comprimeretur compesceretur 3. And what power soever be granted to the faln Angels yet it is by the opinion of all the learned restrained only to these sublunary and inferior bodies and that they have neither power by Creation or Ordination to work upon move or alter things that are Angelical Celestial Ethereal and Superior but only are chained in this Caliginous Atmosphere and impure air For it is manifest that superior bodies work upon those that are inferior but not on the contrary neither have we any examples that can prove that they do operate upon Celestial bodies and so their power how great soever some may suppose it to be is only restrained to these inferior sublunary things 4. The operations and actions performed by the faln Angels may be considered either in the simple respect of their natural and created power and this how great soever it was before their fall is not only lessened but that which remains is limited and restrained with the Adamantine Chains of the decree of divine providence or in respect of what power they may have superadded by God when they are Commissionated and sent by God to effect some particular actions as for example Moses and Aaron had but the ordinary strength and power that was common to other men before they were sent upon the message to Pharaoh and made Instruments to deliver the Israelites for then were they armed and indowed with the power of working great and stupendious Miracles So it cannot rationally be imagined that the two Angels that were sent as Instruments to destroy Sodom and Gomorrha did or could of their own proper individual and created power bring down Fire and Brimstone from Heaven to burn those two Cities but that it was brought to pass by the Power of the Almighty as granted and given to them for that judgment only and not by that ordinary power that they could always exercise for the Text saith Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrha brimstome and fire from the Lord forth of heaven Neither can it rationally be supposed that one Angel
to the act of Venery and thought themselves maleficiated or bewitched when as before they had afforded themselves sufficiently strenuous in that warfar also with their Wives But both being he saith handled and cured by me as persons melancholick and Hypochondriacal have afterwards sufficiently laughed at themselves But I did conjecture them to be melancholick by this because they did complain that about that act they were overwhelmed with an heap of Cogitations From whence it is manifest from what cause that effect did proceed And therefore it is deservedly doubted of Wierus whether or no there be any true impotency at all but what is from natural Causes 7. That the most of those vomitings of strange things is only caused from natural Causes as poysonous Potions Philters and the like is manifest by another example given us by that famous Chymist and learned Physician of Frisuiga in Bavaria Martinus Rulandus which is this David Held Student in the Arts about the twentieth year of his Age did receive from a wicked Woman Cakes which he did eat and departing from her forthwith in the way he began to doat and being brought home he began to rage more and fell into madness And to help this madness the Students came unto me and declare the insanity the Philter that he had taken and his being infected or brought into that madness by it and desire some help against it To oppose which he saith I gave six Ounces of my Aqua Benedicta which I commanded straightway to be given him in the name of Jesus And this being taken soon after by vomiting he cast up the Philter or invenomed Cakes that he had swallowed which being cast upon the Earth they did with the admiration of the by-standers begin to wax hot and to boil as meat with the fire doth grow hot and boil So that this poison being cast up as a thing unhoped for soon after the insanity is driven away and within two days his understanding was perfectly restored and by the power of the Almighty did totally recover So that it is manifest that these kind of people that are commonly called Witches are indeed as both the Greek and Latin names do signifie Poysoners and in respect of their Hellish intentions are Diabolical but the effects they procure flow from natural Causes If any require more ample satisfaction in this point they may find divers Histories recorded in Schenkins his Observations lib. 7. de venenis to verifie this particular 8. There is no one Argument that doth more confirm that what effects soever Devils or those called Witches do bring to pass in humane bodies are wrought by natural means and proceed from natural causes Because what diseases soever are cured by natural causes and agents must of necessity be brought into humane bodies by natural means But many diseases attributed to the Devil or Witches as instruments have been cured by natural means and applications as we shall prove both by authorities and matters of fact And therefore those diseases must of necessity grow and arise from natural causes And for authority we find Helmont affirming thus much And also partly the curing of these diseases is to be had by certain Simples to which the omnipotent goodness hath given a gift from the beginning of the Creation of resisting preventing and correcting of Veneficia Witchcrafts or poysonings and of bringing forth things injected For he saith certain Simples do drive away evil spirits a miserable company of Men who give worship to Gods that are not able to resist the natural efficacy of Simples and reckons some that take away the penetration of the formal light tied to the excrements Some do hinder the touch entrance or application And that there are many such like that do correct the poysons and kill them And chiefly he commendeth the Electrum minerale immaturum of Paracelsus the Phu of Dioscorides being a kind of Valerian with purple flowers and likewise there commemorateth diverse others To confirm this assertion of Helmonts we shall transcribe what the Honourable person Mr. Boyle hath set down to this purpose Since the beginning of this Essay he saith I saw a lusty and very sprightful Boy child to a famous Chymical Writer I judge it to be Joachimus Poleman who as his Father assured me and others being by some enemies of this Physicians when he was yet an infant so bewitcht that he constantly lay in miserable torment and still refusing the breast was reduced by pain and want of food to a desperate condition the experienced relator of the story remembring that Helmont attributes to the Electrum minerale immaturum Paracelsi the virtue of relieving those whose distempers come from Witchcraft did according to Helmonts prescription hang a piece of this noble mineral about the infants neck so that it might touch the pit of the Stomach whereupon presently the child that could not rest in I know not how many dayes and nights before fell for a while asleep and waking well cried for the Teat which he greedily suckt from thenceforth hastily recovering to the great wonder both of the Parents and several others that were astonisht at so great and quick a change And though I am not forward he saith to impute all those diseases to Witchcraft which even learned Men father upon it yet it 's considerable in our present case that whatsoever were the cause of the disease the distemper was very great and almost hopeless and the cure suddenly performed by an outward application and that of a Mineral in which compacted sort of bodies the finer parts are thought to be lockt up Another example he giveth us in these words The same Henricus ab Heer among his freshly commended observations hath another of a little Lady whom he concludes to have been cast into the strange and terrible distemper which he there particularly records by Witchcraft Upon so severe an examination of the Symptomes made by himself in his own house that if notwithstanding his solemn professions of veracity he mis-relate them not I cannot wonder he should confidently impute so prodigious a disease to some supernatural cause But though the observation with its various circumstances be very well worth your perusing yet that for which I here take notice of it is what he adds about the end of it concerning his having cured her after he had in despair of her recovery sent her back to her Parents by an outward medicine namely an Oyntment which he found extolled against pains produced by Witchcraft in a Dutch book of Carrichter's where also I remember I met with it set down a little differently from what he delivers But to conclude this tedious particular I shall only add one observation more from learned Salmuth which is this The servant Maid he saith of Caesars à Breitenbach was taken with a most intense pain of her left arm which when it did not at all remit or abate but that the dolour was augmented
storing it with provisions necessary to keep himself from drowning in Anno Dom. 1524. 2. And that we may be certified how frequent and common these counterfeited Impostures have been and yet are practised take this other from undoubted authority The 15 of August being Sunday in the 16 of the raign of Queen Elizabeth Agnes Bridges a Maid about the age of 20 years and Rachel Pinder a Wench about the age of 11 or 12 years who both of them had counterfeited to be possessed by the Devil whereby they had not only marvellously deluded many people both Men and Women but also diverse such persons as otherwise seemed of good wit and understanding stood before the Preacher at Pauls-cross where they acknowledged their hypocritical counterfeiting with penitent behaviours requiring forgiveness of God and the world and the people to pray for them Also their several examinations and Confessions were there openly read by the Preacher and afterwards published in print for posterity hereafter to beware of the like deceivers From whence we may take these two Observations 1. We may from hence note how subject the nature of man is both to deceive and to be deceived and that not only the common people but also the wiser and more learned heads may most easily be imposed upon And that therefore in things of this nature and the like we cannot use too much circumspection nor use too much diligence to discover them 2. We may note that when such strange Impostures or false Miracles are pretended there is commonly some sinister and corrupt end aimed at under the colour of Religion and that those that are most ready to publish such things as true Miracles and Divine Revelations are generally those that did complot and devise them And therefore the greater number they be that cry them up and the more esteem the persons are of that blow abroad such things the greater suspicion we ought to have of the falsity and forgery of them Always remembring that the greater the fame and number of the persons are that conspire and confederate together the greater things they may bring to pass and be more able to deceive as was manifest by the Priests attending the Oracles who though they laboured to father their predictions upon some Deity yet it was manifest that it was nothing else but their own Confederacy Impostures and Juglings 3. But these Diabolical Counterfeitings of possessions and the maintaining of the power of dispossession and casting forth of Devils was not only upheld and maintained by the Papists to advance their superstitious courses but also in the said time of Queen Elizabeth there were divers Non-Conformists to gain credit and repute to their way that did by publick writing labour to prove the continuation of real possessions by Devils and that they had power by fasting and Prayer to cast them out Of which number were one M r Darrell and his Accomplices who not only writ divers Pamphlets in the positive defence of that opinion but also published certain Narrations of several persons that they pretended were really possessed with Devils which were cast forth by their means in using Fasting and Prayer Which writings were answered by M r Harsnet and others and their Theory not only overthrown but their practice discovered to be counterfeiting and Imposture Whereupon there were divers persons suborned to feign and counterfeit possessions as William Sommers of Nottingham who by the Exorcists was reported to have strange fits passions and actions which are at large described and set forth in that learned Treatise Dialogical Discourses of Spirits and Devils written about the same time by John Deacon and John Waller Ministers and of divers other persons who likewise pretended the same counterfeit possessions And though the said forged and feigned possessions were strongly maintained by their Abettors and the matters of fact audaciously asserted to be true yet after the said Darrell and his Accomplices were examined by the Queens Commissioners all was made apparent to be notorious counterfeiting cheating and imposture both by the confession of Sommers himself and by the Oaths of several Deponents Neither was that discourse containing the certain possession of seven persons in one Family in Lancashire at Cheworth in the Parish of Leigh in the Year 1594. though believed by many for a truth because of the streight tale told by the said Darrell in that Narrative of any better grain but full of untruths impossibilities absurdities and contradictions 4. Our next instance shall be a most strange Imposture acted in the time of King James and in a manner known unto the whole Nation that is of the Boy of Bilson in Staffordshire in the year 1620. by name William Perry whose condition as he had been taught and so left by the Popish Priests take as followeth This Boy being about thirteen years old but for wit and subtilty far exceeding his age was thought by divers to be possessed of the Devil and bewitched by reason of many strange fits and much distemper wherewith he seemed to have been extreamly affected In those fits he appeared both deaf and blind writhing his mouth aside continually groaning and panting and although often pinched with mens fingers pricked with Needles tickled on his sides and once whipped with a Rod besides other the like extremities yet could he not be discerned by either shrieking or shrinking to bewray the least passion or feeling Out of his fits he took as might be thought no sustenance which he could digest but together with it did void and cast out of his mouth rags thred straw crooked pins c. Both in and out of his fits his belly by wilful and continual abstinence defrauding his own â—uts was almost as flat as his back besides his throat was swoln and hard his tongue stiff and rolled up towards the roof of his mouth insomuch that he seemed always dumb save that he would speak once in a Fortnight or three Weeks and that but in very few words Two things there were which gave most just cause of presumption that he was possessed and bewitched one was that he could still discern when that Woman which was supposed to have bewitched him to wit Jone Cocke was brought in to any room where he was although she were secretly conveyed thither as was one time tryed before the Grand Jury at Stafford The second that though he would abide other passages of Scripture yet he could not indure the repeating of that Text viz. In the beginning was the word c. Jo. 1. ver 1. but instantly rolling his eyes and shaking his head as one distracted he would fall nto his usual fits of groaning panting distraction c. In which plight he continued many months to the great wonder and astonishment of thousands who from divers parts came to see him Thus much of his cunning Yet notwithstanding this most devillish and cunningly contrived counterfeiting and dissimulation was discovered and
wrist do appease the Hemicrany and swimming of the head which comes again if they be laid away as he saith the most illustrious Nobleman Cassianus à Puteo most worthy of Roman Purple hath told me The same Noble Puteus he saith hath shewed me the picture of a Meirmaid in his Closet which not many years before was driven to the shore of Malta A certain Spaniard he saith told me that Meirmaids were seen in India having the Genital members of Women like those of humane kind so that the Fishers do bind themselves with an Oath to the Magistrate that they have no copulation with them Bernardinus Ginnarus lib. 1. c. 9. de Indico itinere edit Neap. 1641. doth relate that Meirmaids are seen in the vast River Cuama near the head of Good hope which in the middle superior part are like to the form of men that is with round head but immediately joyned to the breast without a neck with ears altogether like ours and so their eyes lips and teeth And that their dugs being pressed do send forth most white milk Therefore he concludeth There is he saith so great difference of the form of Meirmaids with the Ancients and Moderns that it is no wonder that some do account them figments We have he saith the hands to be seen with eyes and we shew the Meirmaids to be such as in truth they are seen to be Neither do the hands and ribs deceive whose Pictures we have given framed according to the truth of nature 5. But besides these there are other Fishes or Sea-monsters that in all parts resembled Men and Women as these examples make manifest Alexander ab Alexandro a person of great learning and experience relateth That in Epirus a Triton or Sea-Man was found who forth of the Sea did ravish Women being alone upon the shore But being taken by cunning he did resemble a Man with all his members but did refuse meat being offered so that he died with hunger and wasting as being in a strange element 6. Also Ludovicus Vives doth tell us this story In our age he saith with the Hollanders a Sea-Man was seen of many who also was kept there above two years he was mute and then begun to speak But being twice smitten with the Plague he is let loose to the Sea rejoicing and leaping 7. In the year of our Lord 1403. there was taken a Sea-woman in a lake of Holland thrown thither forth of the Sea and was carried into the City of Haerlem she suffered her self to have garments put upon her and admitted the use of bread milk and such like things Also she learned to spin and to do many other things after the manner of Women also she did devoutly bend her knees to the image of Christ crucified being docible to all things which she was commanded by her Master but living there many years she alwayes remained mute 8. To these we shall conclusively add one story of sufficient credit from our own English Annals which is this In the year 1187. being the 33th year of the Reign of Henry the second near unto Oreford in Suffolk certain Fishers of the Sea took in their nets a fish having the shape of a man in all points which fish was kept by Bartholomew de Glanvile Custos of the Castle of Oreford in the same Castle by the space of six months and more for a wonder he spake not a word All manner of meats hâ— did gladly eat but most greedily raw fish after he had crushed out all the moisture Oftentimes he was brought to the Church where he shewed no tokens of adoration At length when he was not well looked to he stole away to the Sea and never after appeared The learned Antiquary Mr. Camden tells this same story from Radulphus Coggeshall an ancient writer and that Capillos habebat barbam prolixam pineatam circa pectus nimium pilosus erat hispidus and concludeth Quicquid nascatur in parte naturae ulla in mari esse non omninò commentitium est By all which examples we may be rationally satisfied that though these creatures have a real existence in nature yet because of their strange natures shapes and properties or by reason of their being rarely seen they have been and often are not only by the common people but even by the learned taken to be Devils Spirits or the effects of Inchantment and Witchcraft And therefore men that would judge aright must take heed that they be not deceived and imposed upon by relations of this nature and also of all such things as may be acted by Imposture and confederacy and those other Physical things that are brought to pass by natural causes divers sorts of which are recited by Ludovicus Lavaterus very largely to which I recommend those that desire further satisfaction in those particulars CHAP. XVI Of Apparitions in general and of some unquestionable stories that seem to prove some such things Of those apparitions pretended to be made in Beryls and Crystals and of the Astral or Sydereal Spirit IN this Treatise we have before sufficiently proved that the denying of the existence of such a Witch as doth make a visible contract with the Devil or upon whose body he sucketh or that hath carnal copulation with a Demon and that is transubstantiated into a Cat or a Dog or that flyeth in the air doth not inferr the denial of Spirits either good or bad nor utterly overthrow the truth of apparitions or of such things as seem to manifest some supernatural operations And therefore here we shall fully handle the question of Apparitions and things that seem to be of that nature and that in this order 1. We shall not meddle with Apparitions in the large extent of the word for so it may comprehend the appearing of new Stars Comets Meteors and other Portents and Prodigies which though unusual and wonderous have yet their production from natural causes But only here we shall treat of such apparitions as are taken to be performed by supernatural creatures or in such a way and by such creatures as we commonly account to be different from if not above the power of ordinary and visible nature as of Angels good or bad the Souls of men departed or their Astral Spirits or of some oâ—her creatures that are or may be of a middle nature 2. As for the apparitions of good Angels sent by God in times past both in sleep and otherwise the Scriptures do give us most full and ample assurance as these few instances may undeniably demonstrate 1. That an Angel of the Lord that is a good Angel did appear visibly unto Manoah and his wife and did vocally and audibly talk and discourse with them both and did after in both their sights openly and visibly ascend in the flame that did arise from the altar Now a more plain and indubitable apparition visibly seen and audibly heard than this
President of a National Synod in those parts to whom also the said Perreaud was well known who was a religious well poised venerable Divine And M r Boyle saith that he had had converse with this pious Author at Geneva and had inquired after the Writer and some passages of the Book which overcame all his setled indisposedness to believe strange things The Character given of this Author and the assent of such learned persons to the things related have gained an ample suffrage to give credit to them also But notwithstanding all this there are many passages in the relation that a quick-sighted Critick would find to be either contradictory or inconsistent and it cannot rationally be thought that he was a Cacodemon his actions were so harmless civil and ludicrous and if he were to be believed and in some things he did speak truth and the Minister himself M r Perreaud did in some things give credit to him he was no Devil but hoped to be saved by Jesus Christ. But whether a Devil or not yet the story for substance doth sufficiently prove the existence of such kind of Demons that can work strange and odd feats 4. M r Baxter a person of great learning and piety whose judgment bears great sway with me speaking of Apparitions saith thus I know many are very incredulous herein and will hardly believe that there have been such Apparitions For my own part he saith though I am as suspicious as most in such reports and do believe that most of them are conceits or delusions yet having been very diligently inquisitive in such Cases I have received undoubted testimony of the truth of such Apparitions some from the mouths of men of undoubted honesty and godliness and some from the report of multitudes of persons who heard or saw Were it fit here to name the persons I could send you to them yet living by whom you would be as fully satisfied as I Houses that have been so frequently haunted with such terrors that the inhabitants successively have been witnesses of it 7. Though some of these last recited testimonies might sufficiently convince the most obstinate and incredulous that there are Apparitions and some other such strange accidents that cannot be solved by the supposed principles of matter and motion but that do necessarily require some other causes that are above or different from the visible and ordinary course of nature yet because it is a point dark and mystical and of great concern and weight we shall add some unquestionable testimonies either from our own Annals or matters of fact that we know to be true of our own certain knowledge that thereby it may undoubtedly appear that there are effects that exceed the ordinary power of natural causes and may for ever convince all Atheistical minds of which in this order 1. In the first year of Edward the Sixth Anno Domini 1551. on St. Valentines day at Feversham in Kent one Arden a Gentleman was murthered by procurement of his own Wife for the which fact she was the fourteenth of March burnt at Canterbury Michael M r Arden's Man was hang'd in Chains at Feversham and a Maiden burnt Mosbie and his Sister were hanged in Smithfield at London Greene which had fled came again certain years after and was hanged in Chains in the High-way against Feversham and black Will the Ruffian that was hired to do that act after his first escape was apprehended and burnt on a Scaffold at Flushing in Zealand The same horrid murther is more at large related by Hollingshead who lived at that time and had information of all the particulars who saith thus much more This one thing he faith seemeth very strange and notable touching M r Arden that in the place he was laid being dead all the proportion of his body might be seen two years after and more so plain as could be for the grass did not grow where his body had touched but between his legs between his arms and about the hollowness of his neck and round about his body And where his legs arms head or any part of his body had touched no grass growed at all of all that time So that many strangers came in that mean time beside the Townsmen to see the print of his body there on the ground in that Field which Field he had as some have reported cruelly taken from a Woman that had been a Widdow to one Cooke and after Married to one Richard Read a Marriner to the great hinderance of her and her Husband the said Read for they had long enjoyed it by a Lease which they had of it for many years not then expired Nevertheless he got it from them for the which the said Reads Wife not only exclaimed against him in shedding many 〈◊〉 salt tear but also cursed him most bitterly even to his face wishing many a vengeance to light upon him and that all the World might wonder on him which was thought then to come to pass when he was thus murthered and lay in that Field from midnight till the morning and so all that day being the Fair-day till night all the which day there were many hundreds of people came wondring about him From whence we may take this Observation As it is most certain that this is a true and punctual relation given us by Hollingshead as being a publick thing done in the face of a Nation the print of his body remaining so long after and viewed and wondered at by so many so that it hath not left the least starting hole for the most incredulous Atheist to get out at So likewise it may dare the most deep-sighted Naturalist or unbelieving Atheist that would exalt and so far deifie Nature as to deny and take away the existence of the God of Nature to shew a reason of the long remaining of the print of his body or the not growing of the grass in those places where his body had touched for two years and more after Could it be the steams or Atoms that flowed from his body then are why not such prints left by other murthered bodies which we are sure by sight and experience not to be so And therefore we can attribute it justly to no other cause but only to the power of God and divine vengeance who is a righter of the oppressed fatherless and Widdows and hears their cries and regardeth their tears 2. In the second year of the Reign of King James of famous memory a strange accident happened to the terror of all bloody murtherers which was this One Anne Waters enticed by a lover of hers consented to have her Husband strangled and then buried him secretly under the Dunghil in a Cow-house Whereupon the man being missing by his Neighbours and the Wife making shew of a wondering what was become of him it pleased God that one of the inhabitants of the Town dreamed one night that his Neighbour Waters was strangled and buried under the
charms there is any force or efficacy and this we shall endeavour from the best and most punctual Authors that have come within the compass of our knowledge or reading and that in this order to which we shall add some observations 1. I think there are few that have been or are Students or Practitioners in the Art of Medicine that have not either heard or read the writing of that most able and learned person Johannes Fernelius who was Physician to the most Christian King of France Henry the second who in that most profound piece that he writ De abditis rerum causis gives us as an ocular witness this relation I have he saith seen a certain Man who by the virtue or force of words did brings various Specters or Apparitions into a looking-glass which did there so clearly express forthwith either in writing or in true images whatsoever he commanded that all things were readily and easily known to those that were by 1. From hence we may observe that Fernelius seeing this as he saith with his eyes cannot being so great a Scholar and a circumspect person be imagined to have been deceived or imposed upon though as much as he relates might have been brought to pass by the artificial placing of the glass and having several images and things written moved by a confederate placed in some secret corner where the images might fitly be reflected from the glass to the sight of the by-standers or by some other means performed by the optical science and confederacy And it is no sure ground to introduce a Demon to act the business when artificial means may rationally solve the matter neither was it impossible but he might mistake in the conjecture of the cause of those Phenomena 2. And though he seems by his preceeding discourse to believe it to have been caused but by a league and compact betwixt the person that shewed it and some Cacodaemon yet he bringeth no better proof for it than the rotten authority of Porphyrius and Proclus and no convincing argument that Demons can perform any such strange matters And however if they were the meer apparitions of evil spirits it is much to be wondered that Fernelius would be present at any such sinful and dangerous sights or have such familiar conversation with any of that damned crew seeing he there saith Quae omnes prorsus vanae captiosae sunt artes 3. If these Apparitions were caused by Cacodaemons then there was no efficacy in the words at all they were nothing but the sign of the league betwixt the evil spirit and the person that represented them and then he need not have said that they were derived into the glass vi verborum and so this will not prove that it was effected by force of the words But if all this that he relates did proceed but from lawful and natural causes as Paracelsus strongly holds the glass being but made as that which he saw in Spain of the Electrum that he mentions then the words might be efficacious and so it is a punctual instance to prove that words are operative which is the thing de facto that we here seek after 2. The next History to this purpose we shall take from Antonius Benevenius as we find him quoted by that learned person Marcellus Donatus and likewise Dr. Casaubon for I have not the book by me who renders it thus A Souldier had an arrow shot through the left part of his breast so that the iron of it stuck to the very bone of the right shoulder Great endeavours were used to get it out but to no purpose Benevenius doth shew that it was not feasible without present death The Man seeing himself forsaken by Physicians and Chirurgeons sends for a noted Ariolus or Conjurer who setting his two fingers upon the wound with some Charms he used commanded the iron to come out which presently without any pain of the patient came forth and the Man was presently healed And this the Doctor who I presume had the book saith that Benevenius saith vidimus we have seen it which Marcellus Donatus saith the Author ascribed to the virtue of the words and others to the force of imagination 1. Here we may observe that this may either be brought to pass by the efficacy of the words or charms that he muttered and then we must needs confess that charms are of great and stupendious force or that it might be effected by the imagination of the Charmer and then we must suppose which the most do deny that the imagination of the person imaginant hath power to operate upon ex traneous bodies if it had power to cause the iron to come without harm forth of the wounded Souldiers body or it may be caused and that in most probability by the imagination of the party wounded being excited and roused up by the uttering of the charm in which the patient in all likelihood had no small confidence And so however the charm was an accidental cause or as they use to say causa sine qua non of the bringing forth of the iron 3. Another History we must borrow from the aforesaid two Authors Donatus and Dr. Casaubon which they have transcribed forth of Johannes Baptista Montanus because I have not the Author by me and is this My self with mine eyes you may he saith believe me have seen it A certain man who when he had made a circle and drawn some characters about it and uttered some words he did call together above a hundred Serpents And further saith that though he did murmur certain words yet he holdeth that the bringing of the Serpents together was not performed by the force of the words but by the power of a strong imagination and that some by the strength of imagination not ofwords are said to draw forth darts and to cure wounds 1. And here we may take notice that this is a punctual and positive History plainly declaring the matter of fact in calling together above an hundred Serpents and this must be done either by the force of the words or by the strength of the persons imagination or both unless we must admit the Devil to perform it which may vainly be supposed but cannot be proved by what natural means he should bring it to pass But however the relation is very credible Montanus being a famous Physician and Professor at Padua and affirms it as seen with his own eyes 4. To these we may add one of sufficient credit from the learned Masius as it is cited by Wierus and Dr. Casaubon which may be we have related before but not to this purpose and is this I also he saith have seen them who with words or charms could stop wild beasts and force them to await the stroak of the dart who also could force that Domestick beastly creature which we call a Rat as soon as seen amazed and astonished to stand still as
Devils power and of this opinion are the greatest part of the learned 2. Are those that hold that the words or charms are but means to heighten the imagination and that it is the strength of the exalted imagination only that produceth those things that seem to be effected by those words or charms and of this opinion was Avicen and many of the Arabians Ferrerius Montanus and many others 3. There are those that hold that there is a natural efficiency in words and characters rightly fitted and conjoined together in proper and agreeable constellations and of this opinion were Johannes Ludovicus de la Cerda Johannes Branus Camisius Lusitanus Paracelsus Galeottus Martius Henricus Cornelius Agrippa and many others and of these we shall speak in order 1. The first opinion doth takeup a false supposition for its ground to wit that the Devil doth make a visible and corporeal league with the Charmer by virtue of which compact the effects are produced and if this compact be not explicite yet it may be implicite and so the Devil operateth the effects thereby to draw the Charmer into his league and service But we have before sufficiently proved the nullity of any such Covenant and shewed plainly that it is a false impious and diabolical Tenent and that there is not nor can be any other league betwixt the Devil and wicked men but what it spiritual internal and mental and therefore that the Devil doth not bring those effects to pass by pretence of a league that hath no being or existence 2. We have proved by the unanimous consent of all the whole army of the learned that the Devil can work no alteration or change in natural bodies but by the applying of fit agents to agreeable patients but what agent could the Devil have applied to make the iron that stuck in the Souldiers shoulder-bone related by Benevenius to come forth without pain surely none at all For where an agent in nature is awanting to produce an effect there the Devil must needs also be lame and can effect nothing and if either the words had a sufficient natural power to cause the iron to come forth or the Souldiers imagination exalted by confidence in the Charm and Charmer then the Devils help is in vain implored or he brought in to be an actor of that he hath no power at all to perform and there was no other natural agent applied and therefore it must of necessity be one of the two that produced the effect and not a Demon. 3. It cannot in any reason be imagined that the Devil that for the space of above five thousand years hath been the bitter and inveterate enemy to the health of Man both in Soul and Body should now be become a Physician an healer We read that God sent forth evil Angels amongst the people but he sent forth his word and they were healed But it is manifest that the evil Angels since their fall are ordained of God to be the instruments and organs for the executing of his wrath and the good Angels are his ministring Spirits for the good of his people both in Souls and Bodies and therefore that the Devil should be the author or instrument of curing any disease at all were to make him to act contrary to that end for which God hath ordained him for he is the destroyer that is ordained to destroy but not to heal 4. But we shall take another argument or two from the learned pen of Henricus Brucaeus in his Epistle to Thomas Erastus where about this point he saith this What is that he saith that the most of the Grecian Physicians were ignorant of Demons or that it should be agreeable to truth that they have not judged that Demons had any power either in inflicting or taking away any diseases For that sentence of Hippocrates that there is somewhat that is divine in diseases Galen doth shew in his Comment how it is to be understood and Hippocrates himself in that Treatise of the Falling-sickness doth sufficiently open it Notwithstanding these chief men being Physicians and Philosophers by whom the power of natural things and words was principally looked into they were more willing to assent to things that were evidently apparent than take away the force of incantation by it self By it self he saith Because they have had no remembrance of Demons from whom the causes of such effects which follow incantations do seem only they can possibly be derived 5. Before he argueth thus But the curation of diseases which are performed by conjurations and imprecations he ascribeth unto the Devil Notwithstanding he saith some things do move a scruple to me because that some things of them do seem to be of that kind which cannot at all be referred to Demons in which no league or compact doth seem to interceed For leagues or compacts seem to be contracted for that also those things comprehended are to be performed to those that Covenant that by that means those that Covenant with him may be withdrawn from the worship of the true God or that some may be confirmed in their impiety Which causes in Men to whom the true God is utterly unknown have no place for neither are they to be withdrawn from the true God whom they altogether ignore or to be confirmed in impiety when they have been brought up in the worship of Idols from their tender years For he saith Aloisius Cadamustus in the 18 Chap. of the Indian Navigations relateth that Serpents seeking to destroy Sheep in the Kingdom of Senega which is given to Idolatrous Worship they will on the night aim by heaps at the Sheep-folds from whence they are driven away with certain conceived words and this reason is not unknown to many others And that Trallianus where he treateth of the stone acknowledgeth the force of incantations in healing of diseases and he witnesseth that Galen himself taught by experience did come over to this opinion For though Galen before as we have shewed did account charms but as Aniles fabulae yet this Author Trallianus doth quote a piece of Galens wherein he maketh a retractation of that opinion and it standeth with good reason that it might be so Trallianus living near his time and so might notwithstanding what Guitterrius bawleth to the contrary have that part of his writing that since might be lost for I remember Paracelsus somewhere saith that in his travels he found the works of Galen far more genuine and incorrupt than those that were published and extant 6. A further reason this Author gives us thus Furthermore he saith that it is not impious to frame to cure a disease with conceived words and cannot be perswaded to believe it especially seeing that those diseases that are caused by Magick are only to be cured by Magick But he saith I confess that compacts with Demons are not to be entred into but that compacts being entred
are by a most curious and secret art not only composed and joined together but also are prepared at such chosen and fit times that the Heavens may more powerfully infuse their virtues and influences into them which is not observed in the composition of tunes 6. There is no one thing if true and that Kercherus and others have not told us abominable lies that hath more induced me to believe that there is some natural virtue in words and charms composed in a right way or Rhythme than because those that are stung or bitten with the Tarantula or Phalangium are cured with Musick and that not with any sort of Musick but with certain proper and peculiar tunes which are diversified according to the colour of the Tarantula that gave the venemous prick or bite and so by dancing they sweat forth the poison And Kercherus further tells us not only that those that are stung with the Tarantula are cured with Musick but that the Tarantula's themselves with dance when those tunes are modulated that are proportionable and agreeable to their humors Now if tunes modulated in proportionable and sympathizing ways agreeable to the humours do cure those that are stung then much more may words and charms rightly composed and joined together and that in a due selected time under a powerful constellation produce such effects as to cure diseases and move animals to divers and various motions for betwixt the prolation of words putting the Atomes of the air into a fit motion site figure and contexture suitable to perform the end intended and the vibrating and various figuring the air in its motion by musical tunes there is no difference at all in respect of the material or efficient cause and so either of them may produce like effects 7. There is also an experiment that hath been sufficiently tryed and attested which doth much induce me to believe that there is efficacy in words and charms above their significancy by imposition and institution and that is this They take two Lutes rightly stringed and laid upon a long table and then they lay a light straw chaff or feather upon the Unison string of the one and then they strike or move the Unison string of the other Lute that lieth at the other end of the Table by which motion of the Unison-string at the one end of the Table the straw chaff or feather upon the Unison-string of the Lute at the other end of the Table though it be of the longest sort will by the vibration of the air be moved or struck off and yet it will not do it if the straw be laid upon any other string and then the Unison of the other Lute moved By which it is manifest that the striking or moving the Unison-string of the one Lute doth so figurate and dispose the Atomes of the Air that they are fit and apt to move the Unison-string of the other Lute and so to make the straw fall off as being of an agreeable mood and tempet for the susception of the motion which the rest of the other strings being of different degrees and nature are not for the maxime is true Quicquid recipitur recipitur ad modum recipientis And this being so it must needs be also granted that words and rhythms fitly joined and composed being pronounced do put the atomes of the air into such a site motion figure and contexture that may at a distance operate upon the subject for which they are so fitted and produce such effects as they were composed and intended for especially being framed under powerful and suitable constellations from whence they receive their greatest force 8. The chiefest objection that is usually brought against the natural agency of fitly composed words or rhythms is a maxim of the Schools ill understood and worse applied which is this Quantitates rerum nullius sunt efficaciae unto which we shall render these responsions 1. If quantity be taken mathematically and abstractly then it is true that it is of no efficacy or operation because it is then only ens rationis and doth only exist in the intellect and so can operate nothing ad extra But if it be taken concretely physically and as materiate than it is of force and very operative as two pound quantity of lend will weigh down one pound of the same lead and two ounces quantity of the same Gunpowder will carry a bullet of the same quantity further and more forceably than one ounce of the same will do And one scruple of white Hellebor may be taken when a Drachm will kill and a fire of a yard Diameter will warm a man at a greater distance than a fire but of one foot diameter 2. Figures characters words or speech are indeed properly no quantities For figures and characters are only delineations and circumscriptions of some kind ofmatter and are all whether natural or artificial properly contained under quality and denoting what figure or Form the thing is of Figure therefore properly is attributed to artificial things as to a circle a square a triangle and the like and form to animate things as to a Man an Horse an Oxe and the like And so characters whether ingraven in metals gemms stones clay plaister or wood or written upon parchment paper or the like of what figure or form soever they be are but qualities and do qualifie the matter according to the form and figure impressed in the subject matter which being artificially done the matter is the patient the figure or character is the exemplar cause and the force that maketh the impression is the efficient cause and that these as qualities have some efficacy no rational man can deny 3. But to make it more clearly manifest let us suppose three various figures that are Isoperimetral as a circle a plain square and an equilateral triangle Though they be all of equal circumference yet shall the circle contain more than either the square or the triangle and therefore learned Ramus doth lay down this rule Circulus è planis Isoperimetris inaequalibus est maximus But when the question is asked what is the cause why a circle of figures of equal circumference contains the most The answer is commonly made Quia omnium figurarum perfectissimus capacissimus est circulus but if it be again urged what is the cause that a circle of an equal circumference to a plain square should be more capacious than the square Here the thing being found true by ocular experience the capaciousness of the circle more than the square they being both of equal circumference can be ascribed to nothing else at all but only to the figure and therefore of necessity sigures have in them some efficiency 4. That which we call speech or oration is considered three ways 1. That which is mental and only conceived in the mind and not expressed 2. That which is expressed or uttered by the vocal organs 3. And that which
is written And these are called mental vocal and written The two that is mental and that which is written are referred to the predicament of quality And whereas oration vocal is by some referred to the predicament of quantity as it is the measure of sounds and syllables as it is pronounced whereof some are made long and some short and so while distinct sounds and syllables are uttered in a certain mood they are said to be measured and to belong to quantity But if we will understand aright one thing in different respects may belong both to the predicament of quantity and quality So the prolation of sounds or syllables in respect of their modification and comparing one to another some may be long and some may be short and have a different part of time in their pronunciation and so may Analogically and by way of similitude be said to be measured and consequently referred to the predicament of quantity Yet if we consider speech or oration which consists of sounds and syllables in relation to the efficient cause the material and instrumental which is the breath of Man by his several organs moving modulating and figuring the air which is the subject matter into diversity of sites motions contextures and moods then we must conclude that words charms or rhythms having efficient material and instrumental causes do belong to the predicament of Quality and are of great force and virtue naturally notwithstanding all that is or can be objected to the contrary 5. Lastly we are to consider that the breath of Man being variously modulated by its passage from the lungs by the throat palate tongue and other vocal organs doth make such several impressions and configurations of the moved atomes in the air that thereby so great a diversity of impulses or sounds are made upon the drum of the ear that thereby naturally we are able to distinguish one from another Now humane institution found forth the ways of making these several sounds or tones to be appropriated to such and such things or to signifie the diversity of creatures and things according to the several compacts and agreements of Men amongst themselves so that what one sound doth signifie in one language may signifie another thing in another So that not considering the institution or invention of this or that significancy of several sounds in several languages every sound or articulate prolation doth naturally make a distinct and several impulse upon the ear and thereby the senses and consequently the mind are variously affected by them And therefore the younger Helmont doth give us an apposite passage or two to this purpose Englished thus For as in those of ripe years certain musical modulations being heard do often so efficaciously imprint in the mind the Idea of the voice and tones that diverse do sensibly feel them for so long a time in themselves as it were yet sounding that they cannot when they would be freed from them From whence also he saith the word inchanting seemeth with the Latines and Gauls to have drawn its original So the Idea of our Mothers tongue impressed in infants doth so long adhere there that to them about to speak afterwards it doth as it were place and order the tongue and so is the only one mistress of their speech And again he saith If in times past there were found those who by the benefit of musical instruments could move and mollifie the mind of Man various ways How much more humane voice if it being moderated by prudence do break forth from a living spirit shall not only have power to effect those things but also those that are far greater Having thus far largely handled this point we shall only recapitulate a few things and so conclude this Treatise 1. It being granted that great effects have been produced by words charms rhythmes and tunes we have removed all diabolical concurrence to those effects except what may be mental and internal as in all wicked persons when they use natural means to a wicked and evil end and that as we conceive by sufficient and convincing arguments And especially because where there is no natural agent there the Devil can operate nothing at all and if there be a natural agent his concurrence is not necessary 2. As for the force of imagination upon extraneous bodies we cannot in reason affirm it to be none at all neither dare or will we assert that its power in that respect is so vastly great as many do pretend 3. And for what strange effects soever that are true and real that do follow upon the use of words charms characters rhythms and the like we do confidently affirm that they are effected by lawful and natural means but withal that of this sort in this age few or none are found out that are efficacious But that error credulity ignorance and superstition do put great force and stress upon these things when really they produce no effects at all The Alarm that the Pendle-forest Witches gave to all this Kingdom that they were sent for to London great sums gotten at the Fleet to shew them and publick Plays acted thereupon and the Original Examination coming lately to the Authors hand it is desired the Reader will after these words Page 277. line 4. and had incouragement by the adjoining Magistrates peruse these following Depositions viz. The Examination of Edmund Robinson Son of Edmund Robinson of Pendle-Forest eleven years of age taken at Padham before Richard Shutleworth and John Starkey Esquires two of his Majesties Justices of the Peace within the County of Lancaster the 10 th day of February 1633. WHO upon Oath informeth being examined concerning the great meeting of the Witches of Pendle saith that upon All Saints-day last past he this Informer being with one Henry Parker a near door-neighbour to him in Wheatleylane desired the said Parker to give him leave to gather some Bulloes which he did In gathering whereof he saw two Gray-hounds viz. a black and a brown oâ—e came running over the next field towards him he verily thinking the one of them to be Mr. Nutters and the other to be Mr. Robinsons the said Gentlemen then having such like And saith the said Grayhounds came to him and fawned on him they having about their necks either of them a Collar unto each of which was tied a string which Collars as this Informer affirmeth did shine like Gold And he thinking that some either of Mr. Nutters or Mr. Robinsons Family should have followed them yet seeing no body to follow them he took the same Gray-hounds thinking to course with them And presently a Hare did rise very near before him At the sight whereof he cried Loo Loo Loo but the Doggs would not run Whereupon he being very angry took them and with the strings that were about their Collars tied them to a little bush at the next hedge and with a switch that he had in his hand he beat them And in stead
dispersed in this caliginous air or Atmosphere for the Devil is called the Prince of the air if that be literally to be understood and he compasseth the earth and walketh to and fro in it and goeth about seeking whom he may devour and therefore by their agility of body and celerity of motion may easily know what is done and spoken and may so very quickly convey it one to another and so may most readily communicate things that are acted or spoken at an incredible distance one from another but yet all this no further than Divine Providence will permit and allow of 6. The Witchmongers and others do attribute a kind of omnisciency to Devils in respect of their acquired knowledge which we by no means can allow them and that for these reasons 1. Though it be granted that they do grow and increase in the knowledge of sin evil and wickedness therewith to hurt devour and destroy or gain more skill and craft to lie cheat delude and deceive yet that they either gain or gather any knowledge that is good or for any good end is absolutely false for they abode not in the truth neither are they lovers of truth but are utter Enemies to all good knowledge and verity 2. That they may be Masters of all the arts or wayes of deceit lying cheating and delusion is no way to be denied but that they should as many suppose by reason of their longevity and duration learn and be perfect in any or all of the good Arts or Sciences is to me utterly incredible because they are the Corruptors of all but the perfectors of none else should they be the greatest Philosophers in the World which is false And therefore most Christian and pious was that Sentence of that unjustly censured Person Paracelsus in these words Et licèt Diabolus quidem plurima machinetur hoc tamen cum omnibus suis legionibus praestare minimè potest ut vel abjectam ollam frangat nedum eandem faciat multò is minùs quenquam occidere aut jugulare potest nisi id mandato permissu jussuque ac vi divina faciat The other main point that we undertake to handle in this Chapter is touching the power of the faln Angels and that is to be considered in these three particulars 1. In general in respect of their power either in spiritual and moral things or in things natural 2. Or in respect of spiritual and moral things in particular 3. Or in respect of Physical and sublunary things 1. And for the first it must of necessity be granted that their power since their fall is much diminished or at least restrained and chained and fettered up For they becoming Rebels against the Almighty and not keeping their first Estate but having left their own habitation it was most agreeable to the wisdom and justice of God to take away from them the greatest part of that power and authority that he formerly had given them and so to imprison and chain them up that they might never be able to attempt or perform the like Rebellion again otherwise the Almighty should not have used that wisdom that is ordinary with earthly Princes who haveing overcome those that rebelled against them do not only disarm them but also confine or imprison them And to this very thing do the Scriptures allude when they say that they are delivered into chains of darkness and that they are reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day So that though the Devils still retain their cruel wicked and devouring will and mind yet they are but like the Lyon within the Bars of Iron or Bajazet in the Cage of Iron led about by Tamberlan and so though they be never so cruelly bent to do mischief yet they are under the Chains and cooped up in the Grates of Darkness and kept in Everlasting Chains that they are never able to break or unloose And though he be called the God of this World and the Prince of it yet that is not to be understood that he is the Prince and Ruler of the Creatures of the World or that he giveth riches health honour or the like for those are the gift of God only and not of the Devil but he is the God and Prince of the evil and wickedness that is in the World for in that and by that he reigneth and ruleth and to this purpose saith Rollock Damnatio est Satanae qui peccati author est Nam vit a hujus mundi est secundum principem cui potestas est aeris c. Dicitur autem Princeps hujus mundi quia per peccatum mortem regnat in mundo ut enim teste Paulo Regnum Dei positum est in justitiâ pace gaudio per spiritum sanctum sic regnum Satanae positum est in injustitia morte Unde ipse propter peccatum per quod regnat dicitur rector tenebrarum Propter mortem per quam regnat dicitur imperium mortis habere And upon this place St. Augustin saith thus Nunc Princeps hujus mundi ejicietur foras absit ut Diabolum principem mundi it a dictum existimemus ut eum Coeli terrae dominari posse credamus sed mundus appellatur in malis hominibus qui toto orbe terrarum diffusisunt Sic ergò dictum est Princeps hujus mundi id est princeps malor um hominum qui habitant in mundo Appellatur etiam mundus in bonis qui similiter per totum orbem terrarum diffusi sunt Ideò dicit Apostolus Deus erat in Christo mundum reconcilians sibi Hi sunt ex quorum cordibus principes mundi ejicientur foras And whereas also Satan is called the Prince of the power of the air that worketh in the Children of disobedience it is not literally so to be understood as though he had the natural power of ruling the air and causing of winds hail snow frost rain thunder and lightning for these are all ordered according to the will of divine providence and the causes that he hath established in the Elements So David speaking of the Heavens the Earth and the Elements doth conclude thus They continue this day according to thine ordinances for all thy servants And it is he that ordereth all these as saith the Text Who covereth the Heavens with Clouds who prepareth rain for the earth who maketh grass to grow upon the mountains He giveth snow like wool he scattereth the hoary frost like ashes He casteth forth his ice like morsels Who can stand before his Cold He sendeth forth his word and melteth them he causeth his wind to blow and the waters flow And all these fulfil the will and command of God and not the will of the faln Angels for the Text saith Fire and hail snow and vapour stormy wind fulfilling his word so that if they have any thing to do in the sublunary changes or motions of