matter Iulian was trained up in Christianity and professed it but stealing to magicall Masters they so perverted him with their Magicall sophistry as that they utterly perverted him and that made him as soon as he durst appeare in his own colours apostate or fall away from it Ecebolius the Sophister who was one of Iulians Tutors while Constantius raigned he seemed very ardently to embrace the Christian faith but after that Iulian had obtained the Empire he presently conformed to those opinions and manners of the Emperour which he and his light had infused into him But Iulian being dead he pretended again to professe the Christian Religion and cast himselfe prostrate at the doore of the Church out of which he was excommunicated crying out to such as past by tread me under feet as unsavory salt yet after all this remained light and unconstant in his religion to an utter apostasie at the last Porphyrius that notable contemplator in Magick and practitioner also who of Christian turn'd Platonist and Pagan upon this occasion Certaine Christians of Caesarea Palestinae having reproved him sharply some say scourged him for the notorious scandall as well of his manners as opinions he indigning to be thus dealt withall quite deserted Christianity became a capitall enemy thereunto and wrote divers cursed books against Christian Religion besides those wherein he promoted magicall Philosophy and Paganisme wherein he blasphemed God and Christ and the Holy Ghost depraved and wrested the Scriptures calumniated the Prophets and Apostles and slandered sundry Fathers Doctors and Confessours of the Primitive Church Aquila making some flourishes in the Christian profession but not forsaking his former corrupt habit in the vanities of Astrologie but still abhorring the superstitious positions of Nativities was therefore reprehended by the orthodox teachers of those times But instead of amending those his pernicious errors he perversly opposed them even against the truth it selfe For which being expelled the Church he renounced Christianity turned Proselyte and became a circumcised Iow Pope Alexander the third they say suspended a Priest from his office for the space of a whole yeere for but consulting with an Astrologer about a thest that was committed in the Church Eleusius a Novatian Bishop and one who himselfe had sacrificed to Fortune was depriued of his Bishoprick for the baptizing of Heraclius a presaging Priest of Hercules and admitting him to the degree of a Deacon At Laodicea one Epiphanius a Sophister about to recite an Ode in the honour of Bacchus began to declame hence ye prophane and not initiated to the sacred Bacehanals Notwithstanding many of the Christians staid still as being taken with the fame of the Rhetorician Amongst the rest were the two Apollinares the father and the sonne both Clerks one a Presbiter the other a Lector Of which Theodorus the Bishop of Laodicea being advertised he reasonably chid the lay people and so pardoned them But as for the Apollinares after long sharp and publique rebuke he interdicted them the Church and communion of Christians Anatolius very familiar to Gregorius the Bishop being found to have sacrificed to Idols at Antioch and the prefect of the East being but too negligent and remisse in judging him for it the people began to rise in tumult and to lay hands upon Gregory himselfe whom they also impeached of Idolatry but unjustly Hereupon by the command of Tiberius the Emperour him that succeeded Iustin Anatolius was called in question and not having whereof to accuse Gregory at the acclamation of the people who could not endure such a wickednesse unpunished he was not only excluded the Church but condemned to the beasts 15. Of those that have retracted recanted repented of the study practice and consult of Magick and Astrologie and that either fruit fully or unfruit fully desperately or contritely MAnasseh was a Magician for he observed times and used inch auntments used witcherast and dealt with a familiar spirit and with wizzards 2 Chron. 33.6 yet we believe that he truly and unfainedly repented and although his prayer be Apecryphall for be besought the Lord his God and humbled himselfe greatly before the God of his father and prayed unto him and he was entreated of him and heard his supplication Then Manasseh knew that the Lord be was God Vers 12 13. Neither doe we make any doubt of the hearty and effectuall repentance of those Exercists Acts 19.17 18. because feare fell on them all and the name of the Lord Iesus was magnified and many that believed came and confessed and shewed their deeds many also of them which used curious arts brought their books together and burned them before all men So mightily grew the word of God and prevailed The like we believe of the Damsell Act. 16.16 17 18. because possessed with a spirit of divination passive rather then active the divel divining by her rather then she by the Divel The same followed Paul and us and cried saying these men are the servants of the most high God which shew unto us the way of salvation A good confession in all respects take it to be the Damsels and not the Divels speech giving God and his Ministers their due and yet claming their own interest withall But as for Simon Magus his repenting pray ye to the Lord for me that none of these things which ye have spoken come upon me Acts 8. 24. who can judge it to be other then false and fruitlesse For he was terrified onely with an apprehension of the punishment not of the sin and put off that duty to others which he should have exercised himselfe Tiberius importunate to know who should be his successor in the Empire it was answered even he that should first come to him the next morning Hereupon he gave order to his Tutor to bring his Nephew Tiberius to him very early the next day and the day appearing commanded Euodus ignorant of his intent and desire to goe out and bring in to him the first youth that he met which fell out to be Caius which when Tiberius saw he was infinitely troubled exceedingly beshrewing himselfe that he had sought after any Augurie or presage at all For whereas he might have lived and died a great deale more contentedly had he been altogether ignorant of things future their fore-knowledge now served onely to adde both to the miseries of his life and death After the death of Caesar which was said to follow the fatidicall prediction of Spurina the Mathematician the people lamented and wisht that the cursed Diviner had rather lost his skill then that a father of his Countrey should so have lost his life Nero was himselfe held to be a great Mag astro-mancer and wanted neither wit nor will nor wealth nor Tutors nor instruments nor study nor credulity yet for all this confessed that he never found any argument of truth nor experiment of reality in magicall operation which made him at last abdicate and renounce it reject and contemne it and abhorre
three a man was immolated whom led by youths about the altar at length was smitten by the Priest with a speare and so laid upon the fire and burnt which thing Dyphilus the King of Cyprus in the time of Seleucus abhominating appointed that not a man but an Ox should be sacrificed to Diomedes Amongst the Aegyptians in Heliopolis they sacrificed men To Juno they sacrificed three in a day To Dionysius called Omadius by those of Chios a man was sacrificed being cruelly torn in pieces The Lacedaemonians were wont to sacrifice a man to Mars The Phaenicians in the calamities of warre and pestilence were wont to immolate their dearest friends to Saturne The Curetes sacrificed of old their children to Saturne In Laodicea of Syria a Virgin was offered to Pallas The Arabians every yeere sacrificed a child and buryed it under the Altar All the Graecians commonly immolated a man before they went out to warre In the great City of Latinus a man was sacrificed upon the solemnity of Jupiter Not onely in Arcadia to Pan Lyceus nor in Carthage to Saturne but all men in common upon the appointed day of sacrificing a man did sprinkle the Altar with mans blood It was the manner of the Ancients in great calamities dangers that the Prince of the Nation or City should give up the best beloved of his children to a vengefull divell as a reward of redemption and mystically to slaughter him so delivered up Saturnus the King of that Region which the Phaenicians call Israel who after he had put off man being brought to the starre of Saturne having a deare and onely sonne of Anobret his new married Spouse called Jeud for so the Phaenicians call an onely sonne because the City was pressed with a most great and dangerous warre Him clad in regall ornaments he offered upon the Altar built and prepared to that purpose Aristomenes Messenius sacrificed three hundred at once to Jupiter whom they call Ichometes among whom Theopompus the King of the Lacedaemonians was a Noble and Regall Hoste The Tauroscythians whatsoever stranger they took and they took many driven thither by tempest they were wont forthwith to sacrifice them to Diana In Pella a City of Thessalia a man of Achaia was sacrificed every yeere to Peleus and Chiron The Cretians did immolate a man to Iupiter The Lesbians to Dionysius The Phocensians to Diana Herechteus the Atticke and Macharius the Roman one sacrificed his daughter to Proserpina the other to a Daemon his defensor Jupiter and Apollo is said to have brought great calamity upon Italy because the tenth part of men was not sacrificed to them The Pelasgi and the Aborigenes the earth being fruitlesse vowed to sacrifice to Iupiter and Apollo the tenth part of all that should be born The Celti and almost all the more Easterly people did sacrifice by homicide Saturne was angry with the Carthaginians because whereas formerly they had sacrificed to him the more excellent of their sonnes afterwards they immolated to him infants privily bought and obscurely educated instead of their children whereupon to appease him they publiquely sacrificed to him two hundred of their most Noble young men The Athenians being afflicted with famine because of the slaughter of Androgeus and flying to the Gods for helpe Apollo did not answer that the Gods were to be pacified with righteousnesse humanity repentance or contrition but he adding death to death and plague to plague and cruelty to cruelty commanded that seven males and as many females not infants but men grown should every yeere be sent into Creet and there sacrificed Cepheus King of the Aethiopians and Cassiope his wife had one onely daughter named Andromeda in his time a huge sea monster infested the Countrey whereupon they consulting the Oracle for remedy answer was returned that could not be till Andromeda was exposed to that monster to be devoured Thus cruel were the Stars to those that afterwards were made Stars themselves Tiresias promised victory to the Thebanes but upon this condition that the sonne of Creon should be sacrificed as a victime for his Countrey Chalcas did vaticinate or prognosticate the destruction of Troy but upon the successe enjoyned that Iphigenia the daughter of Agamemnon should be immolated The Delphian Oracle being consulted about a great plague grassating among the Ionians it was answered that it could not be remedied unlesse Menelippus and Cometho and not onely so but unlesse a young man and a mayd were yeerely offered up at Diana's altar The Messenians consulting about some issue of their long warre with the Lacedaemonians it was predicted that theirs should be the victory but upon this condition that they should sacrifice an incorrupted virgin of the Aepytidaean family unto their God whereupon Aristodemus to gratifie his Countrey destinated his onely daughter to the immolation After the death of Julian the apostate there was found in Antioch sundry heads and carcases of men women and children hidden in chests wells pits and other secret holes all which he had idolatrously and barbarously caused to be slaine for Necromancy and divinations sake Especially in Carras in the Temple where he had performed his execrable abomination immediately before his going into Persia and had straitly commanded that the doores should be kept lockt and none to enter in till his return There was found a woman hanged up by the haire of the head her hands cut off and her belly ript up and all to vaticinate and ariolate his Persian Victory Such like anthropomanticke Sacrifices were used by Mithridates Heliogabalus c. by the Druides among the French by the Gothes to their God Odhen and by the Sclavonians to their great God Swantmith and more efficacious in answers to whom they were accustomed to sacrifice a Christian every yeere In the Taurican Region where Thoas was King it was a law of their sacrifices that whatsoever stranger came thither especially they that were cast upon their shore should be slain as a victime to Diana Taurica Idomeneus King of the Cretians returning to his own Countrey from the Trojane warre Neptune sent such a tempest that he was constrained to vow a Sacrifice unto him the first creature that met him as he came out of his ship now his owne sonne first meeting him to welcome his safe arrivall was so served In Albania a Region not farre distant from the Caspian sea they used to immolate a man to the Moon where many of the servants did divine and he that was most transported therein wandring alone in the wood was taken and bound by the Priest with a sacred chaine and nourished delicately for the space of a yeere and then led to be Sacrificed with the rest of the hosts That there were such heathenish and inhumane immolations and they pertaining to all kinds of divination either as preparations thereto or as consequents thereof is most evident and undeniable Deut. 18. v. 11 12. 7. Of the fatuity of fatations or fatidicall divinations HOw often is
their Art But have they not read that Cicero derided Spurina as well as Caesar did And if they compare Authors they shall read that Caesar himselfe had noted that the Ides of March would be ferall to him because of Scorpio's declining So then it is easie to be observed that the effect followed because of his superstition rather then his derision It is well noted of the same Caesar that for no religion that is fatidicall superstition he could be deterred or retarded from any enterprize When the hoste escaped from the Immolator a direfull omen for the sacrifice to avoid the Altar he notwithstanding would not deferre his expedition against Scipio and Iuba In his profection into Africa as he went out of the ship he chanced to fall slat upon the ground an ill omen yet he presumed it for the best sign and said I now hold thee fast O Africa Yea he carried a Baffoon Jester along with him on purpose to elude the invincible name of the Scipio's in that province and though he went on against the admonitions of the greatest Augurs yet he the rather prospered for his own resolution Pyrrhus was wont to say merrily that he conceived himselfe to be born under Hercules his Star because the more victories he had gotten against the Romans the more sharply they still rose up against him Cato used to say he wondred how one Astrologicall diviner could look upon another and not laugh sc that they had so neatly agreed together to delude all others But the world is turn'd since Catos time and they must now give it leave to laugh at them and their delusions A certaine Astrologer telling it in or to an Assembly that he had there drawn in a Table the erratulae or wandring Stars Lie not friend quoth Diogenes for the Starres erre not nor wander at all but they that sit or stand here to no purpose I adde but they that study and practise an art to as little The same Cynick askt another talking familiarly of the Stars when the came from Heaven Thales as he went on looking up to the Starres fell into a ditch of water whereupon besides the jest his mayd made of him at the present others said of him afterwards that if he had lookt down into the water he might have seen the Stars but looking up to the Stars he could not see the water Bion said the Astrologers were very ridiculous who boasted they could see the Fish afarre off in the Heavens and yet could not see the Fishes hard by swimming in the River Dion one of Plato's Scholars and friends an Ecclipse of the Moon chancing at the same time that he was waighing up his Anchors to saile from Zacynthe to make warre with the Tyrant Dionysius disregarded the vaticinall portent set to saile notwithstanding came to Syracuse and prevailed to drive out the Tyrant One shewed Vespasian a strange hayry Comet thinking to put him in some feare of the portent whereat he merrily replie plyed that prodigie betokened nothing contrary to him but the King of the Parthians his enemy who wore a bushy head of haire After the death of Iulian the Autiochenians even in their sports thus derided Maximus the greatest Magician and chiefe of those that had seduced him by their predictions and praestigious operations where are now thy divinations O foolish Maximus God and his Church have now overcome viz. the Divell and Magicians St. Augustine confesses his Nebridius would often deride his study of Judiciary Astrologie and he was ready to deride him again for ignorant in that art till at length convinced of his own ignorance he prevented the others smiling by his own bewayling Nearchus admirall to Alexander arriving neere the Isle of Nosala consecrated to the Sunne was told of a prophecy that no mortall man might land there but at the instant he should vanish away and be no more seen This made the Marriners refuse butthe Admirall forced them to goe ashore and landed there himselfe to let them see how vaine and contemptible were all such predictions Cato observing one to have consulted a Soothsayer upon a Rat gnawing his hose what an ominous portent said he would the man have suspected if his hose had gnawne the Rat When one wondred at the Snakes winding about his doore bar what a wonder said another would it have been if the bar had twisted about the snake Polydamus conjecturing an ill omen to the Trojanes from the flight of an Eagle holding a Serpent in his talons Tush quoth Hercules the best augurizing is to fight valiantly for our Countrey Prusias refusing to fight because the Diviners had signified to him that the inspected intrailes forbad it as unlucky What said an Athenian Captaine wilt thou give more credit to a piece of calses flesh then to an old Commander Cicero reciting the Diviners prediction of some dreadfull portent from the Mice gnawing the Souldiers Targets or Belts then quoth he may I feare the decay of the Common-wealth because the Mice gnaw'd Plato's politie in my study And if they should likewise gnaw Epicures book of riot and voluptuousnesse might we not thence dread a presage of dearth and famine At Pericles his setting out to the Peloponnesian war the master of the ship being somewhat dismayed because of an ecclipse of the Sun at that instant Pericles cast his cloak over his eyes and askt him what hurt that did him save onely hinder his sight for a little space Alphonsus King of Arragon honouring all learned men and making liberall provision for the masters of all good arts onely ha past by or sleighted the Astrologers The reason of it being asked it was answered by a pleasant wit That the Stars rule fooles but wise men govern the Stars It was therefore for foolish princes to respect and entertain such and not for the wise such as Alphonsus was Scaliger makes himselfe merry with a Fly-driving Configurator who having made a Talismannicall plate for this very purpose he had no sooner set it up but a Fly comes presently and as saith my Translator shites upon it for handsell or in contempt of all such figures Alarielus having besieged Rome some heathenish people had sent for certaine Tusoane Magicians who confidently promised by their art to make him raise his siege and so free the City But Innocentius then Bishop there drave them out thence judging it better and safer for the City to be taken then to be delivered by such divellish means Frederick of Austria being imprisoned by Lewis of Bavaria a Magician promised Leopoldus his brother if he would reward him well for his paines that he would by his art set Frederick at liberty and bring him safe out of Bavaria home to Austria within an houres space And upon a liberall promise his divell hyed to the prison and appeared to Frederick in the shape of a stranger presenting there a horse before him and bad him get upon him and he should presently carry him home into
take the Omen whether she should bring forth a son or a daughter an egge was taken from under a sitting hen and according to the prescripts of divining omination was kept warm in her hands or in the hands of her maids hatching it by turns till at last comes out a Cock gallantly crested or Combed whereupon Seribonius a Mathematician promised famous things of the infant and that he should raign but without any kingly ensign That it should be a male childe he gathered from the Cock chicken but by the same reason why should he be without any kingly ensigne seeing the Cock was so bravely crested or combed Proelus gives an example in a spirit which was wont to appear in the form of a Lyon but by the setting of a Cock before it vanished away because there is a contrariety betwixt a Cock and a Lyon Orus Apollo saith in his hieroglyphicks Dawes that are twins signifie marriage because this animal brings forth two eggs out of which male and female must be brought forth But if which seldom happeneth two males be generated the males wil not couple with any other females nor females with any other males but will alwayes live without a mate and solitary Therefore they that meet a single Daw divine thereby that they shall live a single life The Eagle portends victory but by blood because she drinks no water but blood An Owle because she goes to her young by night unawares as death comes unawares is therefore said to foretel death Yet sometimes because she is not blinde in the dark of the night doth betoken diligence and watch ulnesse which she made good when she sate upon the spear of Hiero. Faustina the wife of Antonius fell in love with a sword-player and fell sick for him her husband how this might be remedyed made his consult with the soothsayers whose advice was to kill the Fencer and let his wife bathe her in his blood and presently accompany with her himself and so the passion would be allayed Melampus the Augur conjectured at the slaughter of the Greeks by the flight of little birds when he saith thou seest that no bird taketh his flight in fair weather Swallowes because when they are dying they provide a place of safety for their young do portend a great patrimony or legacy after the death of friends A Bat meeting any one that is running away signifies an evasion for although she have no wings yet she flies A Sparrow is a bad omen to one that runs away for she flies from the Hawk and makes haste to the Owle where she is in great danger To meet a Lyon seeing she is amongst animals the strongest is good but for a woman to meet a Lyonesse is bad because she hinders conception for a Lyonesse brings forth but once A Dog in a journey is fortunate because Cyrus being cast into the Woods was nourished by a Dog till he came to the Kingdom Mice signifie danger for the same day that they did gnaw gold in the Capitol both the Consuls were intercepted by Hannibal by way of ambush neer Tarentum The Pismires because they know how to provide for themselves and to prepare safe nests for themselves protend security riches and a great Army Hence when the Pismires had devoured a tame Dragon of Tiberius Caesar it was advised that he should take heed of the tumult of a multitude If a Snake meet thee take heed of an ill tongued enemy for this animal hath no power but in his mouth A Snake creeping into Tiberius his palace portended his fall Two Snakes were found in the beed of Sempronius Gracchus wherefore a soothsayer told him if he would let the male go or the female escape he or his wife should shortly dye he preferring the life of his wife killed the male and let the female escape and within a few dayes he dyed But Tully tels the story otherwise and reasons better upon it I marvel saith he if the emission of the female Snake should bring death to Tiberius Gracchus the emission of the male Snake were deadly to Cornelia why he did dismisse either of them For the soothsayers answered nothing of any future accident if neither were dismist And that Gracchus his death followed the cause I believe was some disease and not the Serpents dismission Meeting of Monks is commonly accounted as an ill omen and so much the rather if it be early in the morning because these kind of men live for the most part by the suddain death of men as Vultures do by slauhgters Apollonius and his companions according to his advice caused the phantasm of an Hagge to vanish away by reviling it for he knew that was the best remedy against such invasions For so fearful is this kind of spirits that they once moved tremble and are compelled by feigned terror and false and impossible threats So the Hagge of Menippus Lycius who was the cause of the Pestilence being stoned by his command and the pestilence ceased And was not that because they are afraid of impossible beatings as well as impossible threatnings 21. Of Magicians Astrologers Diviners envying opposing differing contradicting confuting both themselves and one another CAlchas and Mopsus two great Augurs or Astorlogical diviners meeting together at an Oracle of Apollo Clarius fell to contest about their skill in the conjecturing art The question was how many Figs there were upon such a tree or how many Pigs there were in such a sowes belly Which Mopsus guest at and mist not a hair but Calchas because he could not do somuch pining with grief or envy took pet and dyed Eudoxus the chief Astrologer of his time affirmed that the Chaldeans are not to be credited in their natalitial prognostications or predictions Penaetius a Stoical Philosopher and yet rejected the predictions of the Astrologers Anchialus and Cassander excelling in all parts of Astrology yet used it not or rather abused it not to predictions Scylax Halicarnassaeus although eminent in Astrology neverthelesse abandoned the whole Chaldaical way of it Servius Tullius sleeping his head seemed to shine or burn some of the Diviners said that signifyed he should perish by lightning others that it was a token he should obtain Regal dignity Darius dreamed that the Camp of the Macedons was on fire and that he saw Alexander coming to him in clothes of the same fashion as his own were and that he was carryed on horseback through Babylon and so vanisht out of fight At this the dream spellers were divided in their divinations some interpreting it a fortune some an infortune some to the one side some to the other Betwixt the Tyrians and the Macedonians was a semblable prodigle blood on the one part seen in iron and on the other part in bread They of either party interpret it as a token of good successe to themselves But Aristander the most skilful of the Diviners expounded it thus on the Macedonian behalf if the blood had appeared outwardly
and ashes Hamilear the Carthaginian Captaine led on by the Ariolists sacrificed all the while he was in fight in hope of better successe but finding it in the discomfiture of his party to fall out on the contrary he cast himselfe as a desperate sacrifice into the fire to quench it with his blood that had put him in so great hopes and stood him in so little stead Rhadagusus a King of the Gothes in warring against the Romans did nothing almost but immolate or sacrifice for auspication or divinations sake so that they began boastingly to spread abroad Rhadagusus who had reconciled to himselfe the protection and assistance of such Gods was sure to overcome But nevertheless he was taken and slain with above 100000. of his army Papyrius Cursor oppugning Aquilonia the Pullarian Auspicator would needs be presaging clean contrary to his tokens whose fallacie being found out the Consul praesumed a good omen notwithstanding and beginning the fight caused the lying Augur to be placed in the front and the first dart that was cast by the enemy struck him stark dead Eudemus being foretold by a cunning dream-speller that although he was now in exile yet he should return to his own Land within five yeares within which space he notwithstanding dyed in â—â—racusa but to make his prediction good he said he meant his grave which is every mans own land Constantia an honourable dame of Rome having received assurance from Astrologers of a long healthfull and most happy life fell sick within sive daies after of a burning feaver and finding that there was no way but death she strained her husbands hand and concluded both her speech and life with these complaining words Behold what truth is in the vain pregnosticates of fond Astrologers Ninus who detested all Astrologers with their deceipts suppressed Zoroastes who would deale in nothing without their encouragement Pompey with his guard of prophets lost his head and Caesar by contempt of Oracles subdued his enemies Iustinian exiling all sorts of false Prophets with their bag and baggage did flourish as a Conquerour whereas Iulian admitting them with all their packs of falshoods and blasphemous lies did perish as a castaway At such time as Brittanicus waited for the great lot of the Roman Empire by the comfort and encouragement of a vaine Astrologer he lost both life and all by the rigour of a bloody Tyrant Thrasillus the Mathematician whom Tiberius had taken into familiarity presaging good things upon the sight of a ship but things falling out contrary to what he predicted Tiberius was purposed as they walked together to cast him down a praecipice for a falsary and an intruder into his secrets Seneca by a pretty fancy bringeth in Mercury perswading with the Gods that they would abridge the life of Claudius if not for any other cause yet even for pitty and compassion of the poore Astrologers who had already been taken with so many lies from yeare to yeere about this point as if the destinies were not more favourable then their grounds were sure the credit of Astrology would decay for ever St. Ambrose telleth of one that prognosticated great store of raine to fall after an exceeding drought but none was seen till it was obtained by the prayers of the Church Galen writeth that none of all those Prophets and Astrologers whose skill was commended and their depth admired in his time at Rome gave any perfect judgement either as touching the disease the continuance or cure thereof Manfredus a rare Doctor of Astrology assured Ordelaphius a Prince in Italy that that very yeere wherein he died if there were any certain knowledge by his art he should not end his life before extremity of age had made him lame and unweldy Paulus Florentinus lived till 85 yeeres of age and yet he would assure his friends in private that he never found one comfort that might promise long life in the figure of his birth but sudden death with many tragicall and most lamentable accidents The great dearth of Cattle which was so certainly expected by the Calculators Anno 1558. turned to a wonderfull encrease of all kinds of sustenance At the same time that the fond Bohemians were affraid to be consumed with sudden sire that should come down from Heaven as some preachers gave warning they were almost drowned with a second Flood by means of excessive showres spring-tides and store of land-waters that ranne down with immoderate abundance as if God had resolved to descry the falshood of their jugling At another time the people were so scared with an universall feare of waters scattered aboad by prophets of this kind as a certain Abbot seeking to prevent the worst built him a Tabernacle upon the top of Harrow on the Hill but the conclusion is that before Summer was halfe spent all the ditches were drawn dry and the castle perished for lack of water Paul Flerent noting two constellations under which the State of Florence was refreshed after long and bloudy warres findeth them so crosse and opposite one to another as himselfe is forced to confesse that small light of assurance may be taken from the blaze of this Beacon Pencer prognosticated upon the last Comet that our bodies should be parched and burned up with heat but how fell it out Forsooth we had not a more unkindly Summer for many yeeres in respect of extraordinary cold 25. Of the Heavens calculating their own purport without the helpe of an Artist and the suspition of Magastromancers predicting rather by diabolicall instinct or the suggestion of their own Familiars then from any vertue of the starres THe day before Iulian died one and he an heathen watching over night saw a conjunction or compact of the Stars expressing thus much in legible characters To day is Julian slain in Persia Also Didymus Alexandrinus had a vision of white horses running in the ayre and they that rode upon them said tell Didymus in this very houre Iulian is slain and bid him tell it to Athanasius the Bishop Constantine in his holy meditations calling up his eyes Eastward towards Heaven saw the similitude of a Crosse wherein were stars as letters so placed that visibly might be read this sentence in Greek In this thou shalt overcome At what time Caesar was in the battell of Pharsalia one Caius Cornelius a notable prognosticator in Padua beholding the flying of Birds cryed out Now they give the onset on both sides and a little after as a man possessed with some spirit cryed out again O Caesar the victory is thine Such was that of Apollonius concerning Domitian of which before Numa Pompilius a Magician or Sortiary not inferior to any had frequent and familiar company confabulation and congression with Aegeria a Nymphish devill Simon Magus had a dogge they say could speak and doe many prodigious pranks Quintus Sertorius had an Hart which he consulted withall Pope Sylvester the second had a dogge which he held more deare then the Kingdom of Naples
infant and asleep in his cradle there sate hony Bees upon his lips and this must signifie his Eloquence To Mydas in like manner there came pismires and carried graines of Wheat into his mouth this was a prediction of his riches Servius Tullius a mean child while he was sleeping a flame appeared to shine round about his head and this was made to presage a crown Roscius his nurse awaking observed by moon-light a Serpent as it were imbracing the child and this must prognosticate his eminent fame and glory although his height was a Stage player If these occasions were not slight yet could there be slighter divinations or more worthy to be slighted Alexanders father dreamt that his mothers belly was sealed with the impresse of a Lyon upon it Hecuba when she was bringing forth Paris had a vision of a firebrand or burning Torch that should set on fire Troy and all Asia There appeared unto the mother of Phalaris the image of Mercury pouring forth blood upon the earth The mother of Dionysius dreamed that she brought forth a Satyr Adde to these and the like the prodigious birth of Zoroaster their Prince and master and then aske the Magastromancers what need such prodigies at births and such presagings upon them if the natalitiall conjunctions be sufficiently portending without them The Oracles themselves would give answers to any kind of questions were they never so triviall and would presage the erection and restauration of scenicall enterludes as parts of divine service though never so ludicrous And would enjoyn and accept of divining means matters instruments rites ceremonies though never so ridiculous As among the Colophonians in Ionia there the Oracle would afford them the vertue of prophecying from the drinking of water Among the Branchides in the same Province from the sucking in of certaine vapours In another Oracle a woman sate upon a Trevet at the mouth of a cave and was filled with the fury of divination In another a glasse was let down into a fountaine by a slender thred and after sacrifices and imprecations the images of things future were seen in the glasse In another they descended into a fountaine and so vaticinated as they desired In another they consulting burnt lamps offered Incense gave gifts and put their eares to the mouth of the Image then stopping them they went out of the Temple and opening them again the first voyce they heard from any they met they took it for an Oraculous answer In another they judged of things future by casting of Dice c. Severall Countries had their severall waies of divining and all of them esteemed alike acceptable to the Gods and alike effectuall among themselves Tacitus writes thus of the manners of the Germans that they sing as they goe to warre and encourage each other by their Bardian odes acquiring the fortune of their fight by their singing and he that makes the harshest noise is thought to doe it best They take this to be much of providence in children especially females neither neglect they their counsels and answers Velleda the Prophetesse although she was a trouble to them they held for a Goddesse Auspicies and Lotteries they observe especially And for lots the custome is simple A bough cut off from a fruitfull tree they divide into lesser branches or slips and those distinguished by certain marks they cast carelesly upon a white garment and in publique consulting use the ministry of the Priest in private of the father of the family who looking up to heaven takes up every one of them thrice and interprets them according to the imprest markes If any forbid there 's no more consulting for that day if it be permitted then to answer the faith of the auspicies they goe on to interrogate the voyces and flights of birds It is also the property of that Nation to experience the presages and monitions of horses They are nourished publiquely in woods and groves white they are and touch no common work onely put into a sacred chariot they are accompanied by the Priest and the Prince and so they observe their neighing and sweating Neither is there more faith had in any other auspicie either by the common people the Nobles or the Priests For they conceive these to be the Secretaries of the Gods and themselves their ministers There is another way of auspicie whereby they explore the event of warre they get a captive by any means of that Nation with which they warre and commit him and one chosen out of their own common sort to try together in their own Country armes and the victory of the one or the other they make to be a great presage to either side They couple not unlesse some sudden thing chance but on certain daies when the Moon begins to be in the full for that they believe to be a most auspicious beginning for the doing of businesse The mother of Sapor King of Persia being with child and it doubted whether it was a male or a female she went withall for if it proveda female it might not succeed in such dignity For this cause the Princes convented the Magicians to try their skill and pronounce upon the birth Therefore they brought a Mare ready to fole and the Magicians vaticinated upon it and it falling out according to their prediction they thereupon concluded it was a male child the Queen went withall upon this they without delay layd the Crown upon the Queens belly and proclaimed the child scarce conceived to be their King according to their Countries rites and laws Augustus and Marke Anthony were playing together and what a businesse of caution a mathematicall Aegyptian presager made upon it advising the one as concerning their after earnest to take heed of the other as whose genius was too strong for him or his daemon afraid of his As Pope Engenius sung Masse in the Church of Rheimes some drops of the consecrated wine chanced to be spilt and what prognosticating was upon it And no lesse was there upon Thomas Archbishop of Canterbury his singing a Requiem the same day he was reconciled to the King 27. Of the treasons treacheries conspiracies seditious ambitions usurpations turbulencies and busie medlings of Magicall and Astrologicall diviners against Princes Magistrates Kingdomes and States CAmbyses having added Aegypt to his fathers Kingdomes could not endure their magicall religion but abominating their superstitious ceremonies caused the Oraculous Temples of Apis and others to be pulled down At length he was murdered by means of two Magicians who concealed his death and usurping upon his Kingdome raigned in his stead and name But their boldnesse being detected they were apprehended and suppressed by Darius who therefore by the consent of all was chosen King Cobares a man of magick art if an art it be and not a vaine mans deceit yet what ever it be he was more notable for his profession of it then for his knowledge in it He at a feast would needs be counselling Bessus
Duncane King of Scots and likewise Banquo his chiefest friend because of a prophecy that his posterity should succeed in the Kingdome Again upon a Wizards prophecy or prediction that he should never be slain by any man born of a woman nor vanquished till the wood of Bernane came to the Castle of Dunsinane this made him give up himselfe securely to all kind of wickednesse Nisaeus tyrant of Syracuse being foretold of his death by a Soothsayer thereupon riotously lavisht away all his wealth beforehand So did a rich man of Lions upon the calculating of his Nativity but lived and beg'd along time after Natholocus King of Scots desirous to understand somewhat of the issue of his troubles sent a trusty servant of his to enquire of a Witch who consulting with her spirits told him the King should be murdered not by the hands of his enemies but by one of his most familiar friends The messenger demanding instantly by whose hands Even by thine said she Whereupon he defyed her and bad her goe like an old witch and trusted he should see her burnt ere he should be drawne to doe so villanous a deed intending to signifie it sincerely to the King himselfe But by the way as he returned many fears and suspitions arose in his mind especially that the Kings jealousie would not be satisfied with his innocency so that he thought it the surest way for himselfe to doe the deed and thus induced he did it Cambyses dreaming that his brother Smerdis should raigne because he thought he saw him sitting in a regall Throne contrived his death by the means of one Praxaspes a magician who peradventure had either magically sent that dream or else interpreted to that purpose From an old orientall prophecy that about that time such as came out of the land of Iudaea should obtaine the whole government of affairs the Jews slew their governour and rebelled but to their own miserable destruction Vespasian being admonished by the Mathematicians to take heed of Metius Pomposianus because he had an imperiall Genesis whom though he wiser then to give credit unto such things neverthelesse preferred yet Domitian was drawn to put him to death upon the selfe same occasion 29. Of Magastromancers cluding Authority and deluding themselves in a presumption of impunity CLeomedes for many portentous malefices being fast shut up in a close sepulchre or coffin with a cover that many men could hardly lift laid upon it to keepe him safe against the day of triall when the day came he was vanished thence and not there to be found neither alive nor dead When they consulted the Oracle about his portentous escape it commended him for it as one of the last of the Heroes Apollonius Tyanaeus being convented before Domitian when he thought to take punishment of the Magician he forthwith vanished out of his presence Apuleius accused for magicall Arts and practices before Claudius a Christian Magistrate instead of confessing his fault fell to calumniate and traduce the very Laws for exhibiting the same under such penalties One Diodorus or Leodorus a most portentous Conjurer being therefore condemned and led to execution by his enchantments slipt out of the executioners hands and conveyed himselfe in the ayre from Catana in Sicily to Constantinople At last the Bishop of Catana caught him at unawares and caused him to be burnt in a fiery furnace At Cullen a certain Damsell being cited for playing of prestigious tricks she did many jugling feats before the Nobles as rending of towels breaking of glasses and presently making them whole againe c. which made them vain sport and they conclude them to be but joculatory pranks and so she escaped the Inquisitour David Ebroy a magicall Jew made those of his Nation believe that he was the Messiah come to free them from the servitude of the uncircumcised The King of Persia apprehending him he by his sleights escaped out of prison crossed a broad river and could never be overtaken One Caesarius Maltes a praestigious Jugler being taken at Paris escaped prison by his circulatory tricks for which being questioned again in another place and condemned the Governour by his power and against Law reprieved him as much taken with his feats of Leigerdemaine But nothing prospered after that in his government and he died not long after In the territories of Berne one Scaphius boasted that he could scape invisible when he pleased and so had oft times avoyded the hands of his capitall enemies At length when he grew ripe both for divine and humane vengeance he was espied by those that laid wait to apprehend him through a window and was so slain with a speare when he least dreamt of his death Caius Marius a man ignoble and a cruell author of civill warres after the first fight wherein he was vanquished by Sylla being taken naked and muddy by the enemy he was brought to the Minturnians and delivered to the Governour of the City who sitting in councell upon him gave sentence that he should be put to death presently and seeing none of the Citizens would undertake the execution they committed it to a Cimbrian horsman or some say a Frenchman who about to dispatch the businesse heard a great voyce out of a dark place Thou man darest thou kill Marius at which the man affraid let fall his weapon and ran away crying he durst not doe the deed and so he escaped At Venice a certaine maleficall Sorcerer being condemned made all the locks fall off and doors fly open onely by a confection of certain herbs and mussitation of certain charms and so went his way 30. Of God and the Starres and men blasphemed accused calumniated defamed by or by the means of Magicians and Astrologers ALexander in a distempered mood having slaine Clytus his plaine but trusty friend afterwards ashamed of so foule a fact and having no other way to excuse so vile and dishonourable an action he urged his eligion spellers to try their fatidicall arts and to enquire whether it was not the ire of the Gods that had necessitated him so to doe and in conclusion after much calculating inspecting consulting the Gods are made to bear the blame in fatally enforcing so foule an act A certaine fatidicall Philosopher beating his servant for a fault the servant cried out of his masters injustice for punishing him for doing a thing that was not in his own will or power Seeing he himselfe had taught that men are fatally necessitated to doe either well or ill St. Augustine reports of a Mathematician in his time who was wont to say It was not men that lusted but Venus not men that killed but Mars not men that stole but Mercury It was not God that helpt or favoured but Iupiter c. Iustin Martyr Marullus Symeon Athanasius Eusebius Emissenus were calumniated and slandered by Magicians and Astrologers as if they had been the worst of them themselves Kunegunde they say was defamed for a whore by a diabolicall wizzard
So was Turbula In the time of Frederick the second there was a German sorcerer that did use to defame men by reproaching them publikly with their most secret sinnes Blanch wife to Peter of Castile had presented her husband with a rich Girdle unwitting that it was enchanted by a certain Iew so that still when the King put it on it appeared like a snake Maria de Padilla the Kings Concubine and the Iews Proselyte having herselfe a chiefe hand in it most calumniously charged the vertuous Queen with her own sorcerous act instigated thereunto by the envious Iew or Magician because the Queen had justly wrought the whole sect of them out of power and favour at Court But now the King being so imbittered by the prodigious apparition and other magicall predictions the Concubine was so imboldned that she prosecuted the poore innocent Queen to her death And after that so bewitched the King that she got into her place Elianor wife to Humphrey Duke of Glocester was impeached of sorcery by one Bolingbrooke an Astronomer who being himselfe apprehended accused her as accessary when as her greatest guilt in that art was her superstition in consulting not practising of it The prefect of Galatia missing his sonne certain servants of his were accused by the false divination of a pseudomantist as if they had slain him but no sooner were they executed but the young man returned safe home again Alexander being admonished by the divining lots that he should command him to be killed that first met him as he went out of the gate by chance an Asse-herd met him and he commanded it to be done accordingly But the poore man complaining of the injustice that he should being innocent be adjudged to such capitall punishment answer was made that must be imputed to the gods who had advised the King to slay the first that met him If it be so quoth the Asse-herd the lot means another and not me for my Asse which I drave before me met the King before I. The King delighted with this answer the Asse was executed and so the Gods the King and the Asse-herd were all excused by wit more then by Lot Rhea Sylvia the daughter of Numitor a vestall being compressed and found with child both she and her parents agreed to excuse it saying that she had suffered force not from a man but some God or Genius he that had done the deed had likewise predicted that she should bring forth twins which though it so fell out yet by the sentence of the Councell the Law in that case was to be used against her A contention arising betwixt Cleomenes and Demaratus about the Kingdome of Lacedaemonia Cleomenes accused Demaratus as not the sonne of Ariston and therefore ought not to succeed The Lacedaemonians to be resolved in the businesse consulted the Delphian Oracle which Periatis the Priest thereof being corrupted by Cleomenes gave answer that the party enquired upon was not Aristons sonne Whereupon Demaratus conjured his mother from the infernals to answer for him who replied that it was a God or an Heroe that deluded her and begat him And thus they accused one another Tertullian Iustin Martyr Clemens Alexandrinus Athenagoras Arnobius Minutius Foelix Lactantius Augustine and so many as have written against the Idolatrous and magicall immolations of the Heathens have had much to doe to apologize for the Christians against all those false calumnies wherewith they impudently burdened them In simulating the Christians to be given to chuse wickednesse which they themselves were guilty of and to be the cause of those judgements which their own impieties had provoked Iulian and Maximinus were not onely satisfied to have them thus defamed and slandered but took occasion to determine their persecution and extermination During the Popedome of Benedict the third in the City of Mentz a Daemoniacall Familiar that lay lurking under a Sacrificulists Pall as he was sprinkling of holy water accused him publiquely that he had that night layn with his Proctors wife A certain Praetor or Judge having sentenced divers malefactors to death at the accusation of an Ariolist or Pythian vaticinator at length he took upon him to tell him of one more if he would not take it ill the Judge earnest to know who it was he insimulated his own wife and prefixt an houre wherein he would shew him her in the convent of other Witches But he knowing his own wives integrity and mistrusting the others calumny at the time appointed had invited unknown to the Ariolist a many of his kindred and friends to suppe with his wife and him And as they sate at supper he took an occasion to rise and goe with the Ariolist to the place where he shewed him in a spectrous apparition his own wife in the company of other Lamian hagges Enough to have deluded him had he not returned and found his wife at the table where he left her with the testimony of all those at the table that she had never stirred thence Whereupon he caused the Ariolist himselfe to be executed 31. Of praestigious Magicians and Astrologers prodigiously practising their arts for the promotion of their own and others filthy lusts Nectanebus an Aegyptian King and great Magician coming into Macedonia in King Philips time so practised it as to make Olympias Philips wife to dream that she should be married to Jupiter Hammon and should conceive a famous childe by him And thus it was brought about Olympias sent for Nectanebus to learn of him what should become of her in as much as it was rumored abroad that King Philip was minded to forsake her and to take another he tels her under hand that he received a charge from the Oracle as he came out of Aegypt to go and help a neglected Queen whom Jupiter Hammon greatly loved and intended to embrace The following night he causes her to dream of such a thing yea and by his diabolical charm effects the like imagination in Philip now absent in war Thus is Olympias earnestly longing after Jupiter and the next day calls again for Nectanebus and enquires of him when shall be this much expected time He bids her to adorn her bed and make her-self fit to receive so divine a Paramour but adds he will come to her in the shape of a Dragon with a Goats head and horns At the hearing of which she greatly terrifyed he replies if you be afraid of such a congression make me a bed hard by and I will secure you from all affrightment At night to bed goes the credulous Queen royally prepared as became such an entertainment and as soon as all was silent the magical impostor raises a praestigious commotion and apparition and goes to bed to the Queen himself and so begets Alexander the Great hereupon reputed the son of Jupiter Hammon When Alexander was now grown up he with his Tutor and Father Nectanebus walking abroad in the evening and standing hard by the steep of a Rock Alexander hastily
Thales their own Country wiseman or Astrologer and he to Bias and he to Pittacus and so one to another till at last it came to Solon he gave it to Apollo himself And thus was it shuffled up betwixt the Astrologers and the Oraculists Strepsiades consulted a Thessalian Veneficke about pulling down the Moon from Heaven by magicall ends For at Athens they were wont to pay use rent taxes c. upon the first appearing of the new Moon Now if there were no Moon at all to appeare he thought this the onely way to prevent and defeat the creditors Macarius the Mitylenian a Priest of Bacchus bearing before him a face of justice and equity one committed to his trust a certain sum of money which in his presence he hid in a more safe and secret place of the Temple Afterwards the man calling upon him to restore what was deposited he called him into the Temple and there cut his throat Belesis a Babylonian Priest skilfull in Astrology and the art of divining had foretold to Arbaces the Mede that he should eject Sardanapalus out of the Assyrian Kingdome Which so falling out Arbaces made Belesis Governour of Babylon Now an Eunuch of Sardanapalus finding great store of treasure in his house brought it to Belesis who under a colour of carrying ashes transported it away it being the Kings due Which fact of his the Judges sentenced for capitall but that it was the Kings pleasure to pardon him The Romanes having spent much treasure in the Macedonian warre and their people greatly exhausted It was thought necessary that so much should be exacted of the pontificall Augures Aruspicks Diviners c. as might help to supply the present necessity for though they had praedicted faire for it yet had they themselves hitherto payd nothing to the warre This taxe made the predicting Priests so murmur and exclaime at the breach of their priviledges for that they could have wisht they had not been so forward in predicting and auspicating as they were 33. Of the infamy danger misery and ruine of such as have affectedly favoured or preferred and superstitiously credited or consulted Magicall and Astrologicall predictors OCtavius perswaded by certaine Chaldaean sacrifices or praedicting Soothsayers who had promised him that all should goe well with him stayd in Rome till he was there slain by Marcus his Souldiers that had entred the City And after he was dead a Chaldean prophesie was found in his bosome This man saith the Historian was as wise and just as any Roman of his time save that he had this great imperfection to frequent Soothsayers wise men and Astronomers more then men skilfull in arms and government Midas was so superstitiously troubled and distracted about his own dreams that he poysoned himselfe by drinking of Buls blood Aristodemus King of the Messenians in his warre against the Lacedaemonians was so disturbed at the dogs barking like wolves and that the grasse grew in his fathers house or about his houshold Gods which the diviners feared for ominous that he desperately made himselfe away Nicias the Athenian Captain was so exceeding fearful of the portent of an ecclipse that he sate still and suffered himselfe to be environed by his enemies and so betrayed both himselfe and 40000. souldiers to destruction Pomeralius by his predictions was the cause of a great slaughter to Constantine the sonne of Irene and of his own death to boot Stethatus accounted the chiefe Astrologer of his time by a foolish vaticination brought destruction both to Alexius and himselfe Emanuel Connuenus the Emperour much addicted to this madnesse timely besides the perpetuall infamy brought himselfe and a great Navy to utter confusion Peter Leonius a Physician by his vaine confidence of the Mathematicks gave occasion to the death of Laurence de Medices and his own after that Andronicus having made somewhat too severe an edict not onely against Conjurers and Necromancers but against all their relations to redeem the hatred of such severity he began to encourage and consult them himselfe And enquiring about his Successor the magicall diviner used his feats in water and there was seen written backward Si for Is the two first letters of his successors name Noting Isacius that slew him and raigned in his stead Didius Iulianus making the like inquisition by a glasse a child looking in it observed Iulians slaughter and the succession of Severus So was Iulian the Apostate deluded by his diviners to his utter destruction Otho Sylvius was led on by his predicting Astrologers to usurpation and riot and to kill himselfe desperately at last Maxentius was so deluded by his prognosticators with assurance of victory that he went on confidently but was vanquisht and perished Licinius called together his Augurs Aegyptian diviners Necromancers Veneficks praestigious sacrificers and pseudopresagers to enquire what should be the successe of the warre against Constantine They all at once predicted victory without doubt The inchanters made odes and rimes the Augures presignified happy successe by the flight of birds so did the Aruspicall sacrificulists from the intrayles and thus they made him confident to his vanquishment flight and extream confusion Italicus a Christian Governour having an accustomed hors-race with an aemulating neighbour a Pagan comes to Hilarion entreating his prayers because his Aemulator had used sorcerous imprecations whereby to disable his horses and stir up his own Hilarion judging such an occasion not worthy of his prayers counselled him to sell his horses which he kept for that purpose and to distribute the money to the poore He answered it was a publique custome and the other would not suffer it to be laid down and that in such their masteries they used insolently to domineere over the Christians He therefore being much importuned both by him and others condescended whether in merriment or to be rid of the importunity to give him a cup in which he used to drink in and bad him fill it with water and sprinkle his horses therewith and so dismist him This he did accordingly and wanne the goale against all expectation Whereupon Hilarion who thus intended to deride rather then to imitate any Magicall artifice was simulated for a Witch or Wizard by the Paganish party and required to penalty Elianor Dutchesse of Glocester consulted so long with Astrologers Wizzards and Witches till she came to be convented for one her selfe at last and after that lived and died miserably In a town within the territories of Brunswick they had hired a pyed Piper to conjure away all the Rats and Mice that much infested him This he did by his piping and charming but not being satisfied according to his expectation he piped or charmed again and there followed him an 130 children of that place all whom he led unto the side of an hill and conjured them every one into a gaping cleft thereof so that he and they were swallowed up and never seen after A Captaine consulting with a Wizard about the next daies battle he
answered the day should be his upon condition he would not spare to kill the first man he met in the morning Which he performed accordingly and got the victory Then returning home joyfully found to his griefe that he had killed his own wife who out of her great love had come to him disguised in mans apparell thereby to take part with him in that daies adventure Valerian addicted to anthropomancy or predicting by intrailes of men women children was unfortunate in his government taken prisoner by Sapor King of Persia who used him for a stirrop to get on horseback on and afterwards caused him to be flayed alive Another that had lost a silver spoon would needs goe to a magicall wiseman to finde out the thiefe and it was agreed betwixt them that for better discovery he who had conveyed it away should lose one of his eyes and when he came home he found that sad marke inflicted on a little child of his own that had carelesly cast the spoon aside Cecrops having newly builded Athens two prodigies presently appeared in the place an Olive tree sprung up suddenly water strangely gushed forth Upon these Delphick Apollo is consulted who answered that the Olive signified Minerva and the water Neptune and that it was in the choyce of the Citizens to give the name of their City to whether of these they would The Citizens of both sexes are convented the men are for Neptune and the women for Minerva and the female sex being more numerous by one prevailed in the suffrage But Neptune indigning the rejection did so depopulate them with waves and flouds that they were fain to punish their women for their suffrage against him Alcamenes and Theopompus being Kings of the Lacedaemonians there was an Oraculous prophecy that Sparta should be lost through lucre Lycurgus calling this to mind rejected all riches and the people were brought truly into such a superstitious feare that whereas before they thought them the onely benefactors they now condemned them to death that first brought money in amongst them In the City of Come in Italy the Officiall and Inquistor having a great number of Witches and Wizzards in prison taking others with them would needs urge them to shew them their homages to the divell but were so beaten by them that some of them died within fifteen daies others renounced God hereupon and vowed themselves to the divels service Eucrates beholding Pancrates an Aegyptian magician doe many wonderfull feats insinuated himselfe into his friendship and communicated all his secrets to him The Magician at length perswaded him to leave all his family at Memphis and to follow him alone and after they came into their Inne he took a bat a bar or a broom and wrapt it with clouts and by his charms made it walke and appeare like a man and made it minister unto them in sundry services as drawing water c. then with another charm would be turn it into a pestel bolt bar or besome again Now one day when Pancrates was gone abroad into the market Eucrates would needs imitate his familiar and drest the bar or pestel muttered the syllables and commanded it to draw water and after it had done sufficiently commanded it to turn into a pestell or bar again But it would not obey but still drew water till he was afraid of drowning then he took a saw and sawed the bar in two and then both parts began to fetch and poure water in abundance till in comes Pancrates and turned it into what it was at first and so left his fellow and was never seen after of him Iohn Faustus light among a sort of his companions who when they were halfe drunk importuned him to play some of his pranks and the feat must be a Vine full of Grapes as the greater novelty now in the Winter season Faustus consented to satisfie their curiosity upon this condition that they should keep silence and not stirre out of their places nor offer to pluck a Grape till he bad otherwise they might pluck their own perill The praestigious sight is presented and every one had his knife drawn and hold of a branch but not to cut till he spake the word But having held them a while in suspence all suddenly vanished and every man appeared to have hold onely of his own nose and ready to have cut it off if the word had been once given 34. Of an evill Art worst to the Artists or the just punishment and dreadfull judgements befalling praestigious Magicians and fatidicall Astrologers THraseas the Augur telling Busyris the Aegyptian Tyrant that in a time of excessive drought there was no other way to procure raine but by sacrificing some stranger to Iupiter the King thereupon enquiring what countreyman he was and finding him to be a stranger sacrificed him the first And persisting in this inhumane way Hercules comming into Aegypt slew both the tyrant his sonne and all the Ariolists at their owne Altars Certaine Hetrurian Soothsayers gave envious perfidious and unprosperous divinations and directions to the Romans about a statue that was stricken with thunder and lightning for which they were slain by the people and that gave occasion to the boys to sing this proverbe in the streets Ill counsell is alwaies worst to the Counsellor A certaine Germane warfaring in Italy chose to him a souldier that was a Conjurer to be his mate to shew him his skill the circle is made the imprecation uttered the spirit hideously appears is asked about the successe at Gouletta confesses his ignorance and takes time to resolve disappeares and leaves such a terrour and stink behind that they had like to have been poysoned with the noysomenesse and died for feare Examples of the Magastromancers fatall miseries and unfortunate ends are too many to be instanc't in at large Zoroaster the first father of them was vanquisht by Ninus who burnt his books some say that he himselfe was burnt by the divell as he was provoking him by his magicall experiments Simon Magus as he would needs goe fly in the ayre had his magicall wings so clipt that he fell down and broke his neck Cynops as he went about to raise the dead out of the sea was himselfe swallowed up of the waves and died Zarces and Arphaxat both burnt by lightning Chalchas died for envy Tullus Hostilius provoking to thunder was himselfe stricken to death therewith Nectanebus killed by his own sonne Ascletarion eaten up of dogs as he went to execution Onomacritus expelled Athens by Hipparchus Messinius put to the sword by Valentinian Sempronius Rufus banished by Severus Heliogabalus an thropomantist slain and cast into a Jakes Nigidius Figulus died in exile Apoleius accused and condemned before Claudius Maximus proconful of Africa Amphiaraus swallowed up of the earth Romulus rapt up in a black stormy thundring cloud Aristaeus snatcht away by an evill spirit Zito fetcht away quick by the divel A Count of Matscon as he was making merry with his
the Sun a new Eclipse at his death Such a star and such an Eclipse as were miracles in their nature site motion portent to all other stars and Eclipses Such a star and such an Eclipse as were the mysteries of all other stars and Eclipses Set apart to signifie his power in Heaven at the greatest instants of his infirmity upon earth Thus they testified of him and yet was not among these Miracles nor mighty works that were wrought by him 10 Whether Miracles may be wrought out of the Church Although we make not the power of working miracles to be the perpetual note of Gods Church yet we determine the Church to be the proper seat of them And in determining we do thus distinguish That God may be pleased to work miracles all the world over and that by his Angles as his Ministers in the Government thereof but employs not men to that purpose save onely within his Church And do distinguish again that privative miracles or those of wrath and judgment may be wrought out of the Church but not positive or those of Grace and mercy And our reasons are 1. Because the main end of working Miracles is for the plantation and confirmation of the Gospel the truth of Gods word and that cannot be without the Church 2. The power of working Miracles is from a promise and that belongs to the Church alone 3. In a Miracle is considerable not so much the evident effect as the secret intent and this consideration is onely for the faithful in the Church 4. The truth of the word is not to be measured by miracles but the truth of miracles by the Word and where is that but in the Church 5. Miracles tend as to the glory of God so to the edification of the Godly and who looks for that or them out of Gods Church 6. Satans stupendous prodigies are mostly wrought out of the Church but Gods wonderful miracles within it 7. Though it hath been said that miracles were intended for Infidels yet were they not effected but by believers and by believers either to convince or to convert those Infidels 11. Whether wicked men and reprobates may be workers of miracles Not by Angelical assistance not by diabolical confederation not by the secret of Nature not by the study of Art but by divine dispensation they may 1. Because God may be pleased to employ them to this purpose and yet give them no more but a faith of miracles which is common to reprobates 2. Because that of miracles is a gift not simply making accepted but may be given onely for others sakes 3. God hath wrought miracles by dead instruments and why not by men of a dead faith and dead in trespasses and sinnes 4. Wicked men may be used in the working of miracles for a testimony of Gods truth yet not in a manifestation of their own graces 5. Bad men have been imployed in working of miracles that good men might not be proud or overweening of common gifts 6. The working of miracles is not appropriated to godly men lest ordinary Graces might be undervalued and weak Christians might take scandal and despair in their defect of the extraordinary gift 12. Wherein differ true and false miracles or divine and diabolical Theological and magical 1. The one kind are wrought by God by Angels Prophets Apostles and sometimes by the Saints the other not but by devils magicians Juglers ungodly men 2. The one are solid and real in effect the other are phantasmatical and praestigiously deceiveing the sense 3. The one God freely calls to do the other are not done but by tempting both God and the Devil 4. The one are serious and upon occasions of importance the other are ludicrous and serve to make vain men sport 5. The one tend to confirm the Church the other to seduce from it 6. The one are liberal the other mercenary 7. The one profitable the other pernicious 8. The one make humble and modest the other arrogant and full of ostentation 9. The one serves to instruct the other onely to astonish 10. The one are wrought with devout Prayer Supplication Thanksgiving the other by superstitious imprecation adjuration incantation with many ridiculous signes and execrable ceremonies nothing pertaining to the producing of the effect And thus they differ in their Authors instruments dignity quality duration utility end and effect 13. Whether Magicians Conjurers Inchanters Witches c work not their miracles or rather signes wonders prodigies portents by the devils means It is affirmed that they do so for these reasons 1. Because they do them not by God Angels Nature or Art as appears sufficiently by what hath been said already and therefore they must needs do them by the devil 2. Because they operate upon a compact which is evident in that invocation adoration sacrifice immolation c. is hereunto required 3. Because they operate by idolatrous superstitious sorcerous execrable ridiculous signes rites and ceremonies 4. Because they secretly invoke although they outwardly would seem to command which imploration and imperiousnesse yea and dissimulation between both these is to God and good Angels abominable 5. Because their Prayers and preparations are blaspheming railing execrating threatning prophane superstitious absurd ridiculous which neither God nor good Angel can indure 6. Because they seek either to allure or compel their operating power by things sensible 7. Because the fact exceeding Natures order and Arts efficacy yet there can be no reasonable cause why such an effect should be ascribed either to God or good Angels 8. Because the effect is by them ascribed to times places figures characters rites ceremonies c. 9. Because there are used hereunto words besides names of God and Angels barbarous unknown insignificant incoherent apocryphal superstitious sorcerous detorted absurd ridiculous c. 10. Because they make use of means unlawful unapt and not ordained to such a purpose 11. Because they do their feats upon vain and light occasions 12. Because they effect that or seem so to do at a distance which the causes themselves could not naturally do were they proximately applyed 13. Because their miracles or wonders are not wrought but at certain times in certain places and by certain means as under such constellations by such configurations by such animal parts stones herbs preparations confections c. 14. Because they seem to make many cautions in the preparation which they violate in the execution As they caution to cleannesse chastity temperance sobriety justice charity c. yet the exercise is wholly of and to the contrary 15. Because they are not onely ungodly men that do them but they do them for wicked ends As idolatry murder theft covetousnesse lusts pride ambition vain-glory c. 16. Because if there be any truth or reality of extraordinary effect either through natures secret disposition or Arts studious operation yet diabolical suggestion intervenes and prompts the instruments to mingle many vanities and fallacies of signes and ceremonies