The rod in hand set in the midst of the Branches,
He moistens with water both the fringe and foot;
Fear and a voice make me quake in my sleeves;
Splendour divine, the God is seated near.
To make this entirely clear is almost impossible. But what we _can_
get at is very curious, showing as it does, if nothing else, that the
border-land of the unseen world was actually contiguous with that of the
world of Nostradamus. They even overlapped, in his estimation, so as to
form an intermediate neutral territory like the marches in the North,
where the inhabitants of each district could meet and communicate. We
are positive that this is all illusive, superstitious, demoniacal. It
may be so. But one effect it undeniably produces. It unites man more to
the universe, and less to the world; it makes death less strange and
less cold, and furnishes to the soul, and the things of the soul, more
nutriment than it can extract from modern life and culture.
The general meaning seems to be that he sat with a wand, branch, or
divining-rod of laurel, probably forked like the winchel rod of the
water-finders, one fork being held in each hand. This in some way had
power to evoke his Genius (or _génie familier_, as Le Pelletier styles
it). When he appeared, he moistened in the brazier that held water,
himself, the fringe of his robe (_limbe_), and his foot. The rod, held as
I have suggested, then becoming electrical, caused fear with the sound of
a voice and a shuddering up to the elbows. Then shone forth the fatidical
splendour of a divine light, and the Deity is present, seated near to him.
M. le Pelletier tells us that there was a pagan rite of the god Branchus
that corresponded with this fatidical ceremony practised by Nostradamus.
He even suggests that this very Branchus might have been the familiar
spirit of our prophet. It must be admitted that in the _texte-type_, in
the words “_au milieu de_ BRANCHES,” _Branches_ is printed in capital
letters, so that the probable reason for that peculiarity is that the God
_Branchus_, as well as the _branches d’un laurier_, is shadowed forth.
But to suppose that a pagan deity could ever be either the familiar
or the guardian angel of a son of the Church of Rome makes such a
Renaissance-jumble of the two religions that I think we had better not
meddle with it.
As to the assertion that there was a pagan rite of Branchus, I doubt it
much; and, if there were, certain it is that Nostradamus speaks here far
too covertly for us to assume from his writing that he was discharging
any rite special to Branchus. He seems to be following out the usual
magical forms employed for establishing vaticinatory connection with
the other world, or setting up the counter analogy between mind and
spirit, according to that beautiful esoteric verse in Ecclesiasticus
(xlvii. 24), “All things are double, one against another; He hath made
nothing imperfect.” Were such things never to interlink, men might well
say, as they do now in the wisdom of science, that spirit and intellect
are not doubles, and that no knowledge can be reached save by physical
experiment. In this case there will be a particular link missing if
science be right. The sage, _Estant assis de nuict secret estude_, will
earnestly desire such assumption may prove to be erroneous. He will
readily formulate with St. Paul that the invisible things from creation
may be known from the visible; but also that the visible things can
never be understood but by the invisible. Recollect that the visible is
not visible to the visible, but to the invisible alone. The eye is the
machine of sight, but not sight; and who has seen the eye of the eye?
The Greek myth about Branchus, so far as I can see, is this, with sundry
forms and variations. He was a youth of Miletus. The reputed son of
Smicrus (_Lempriere_), or Macareus Varro says, but begotten by Apollo.
The mother dreamed that the sun entered her mouth, and, passing through
her, the child at birth was named _Branchus_, or βρόγχος, the throat.
Afterwards he kissed Apollo in the woods, and became endowed with the
gift of prophecy. He had a temple at Didyma, which Pausanias calls the
Temple of Apollo; but Varro goes on to say that after the kiss of the
god he prophesied, but quickly after disappeared, when a grand temple
was jointly dedicated to him and to Apollo,—_Philesius_, from φιλεῖν, to
kiss. His oracles at Didyma were inferior to none but Delphi. The name
Didymean, _double_ or _twain_, was from the double light of the sun and
its reflection in the moonlight. Sun-touched and moon-struck madness and
inspiration may in Branchus be said to meet, as out of one throat come
things good and evil. The name Didymean was changed to Branchidæ Strabo
(Book xiv.) relates that the priests of this grand temple betrayed its
treasures to Xerxes, and accompanied him in his retreat to escape the
punishment of their sacrilege. They had settled near to Sogdiana, when
Alexander arrived there (Strabo, Book xi.); he destroyed them and their
city. This Byronical madman, who could see no iniquity in the slaughter
of thousands to gratify the lust of a crack-brained ambition, thought
to promote morals by slaughtering the descendants of traitors, they,
the descendants, being innocent of everything except being born. The
Milesians had long ago rebuilt the temple of Branchus on such a scale
that in magnitude it surpassed all others in Greece. It was, in fact, too
big to be roofed in, being four or five stadia in compass. Those who wish
to see more can consult Suidas, s. v., βραγχίδαι.
The gloss of M. le Pelletier on the quatrain is as follows: that
Nostradamus, wand in hand, touches the branches of the tripod, like
the priests of Branchus (this I have tried to expunge), and invokes
his familiar spirit, which appears to him in the vapour floating above
a basin of water, which he had consecrated beforehand according to
prescribed magical rites, and in which he dips the fringe of his garment,
and his feet. An involuntary shivering (_peur_) agitates his hand when
about to write from the dictation (_voix_) of the spirit. The fatidical
light shines, and the angel is seated at his side. Le Pelletier takes
occasion here to remark that mediums at this day write under a spirit of
dictation, to which they simply lend their arm as an instrument.
Garencières’ interpretation is that of most of the old commentators, even
down to the time of M. Bareste, 1840. The rod is a pen, in the middle of
the branches means his fingers, the water is the ink, and wetting limb
and foot is covering the paper all but the four margins. It is hardly
unfair to say that this is both nonsensical and ignorant, although not
devoid of ingenuity. I think it will fit the circumstances far better to
take it, as I have done, that the wand was a forked laurel branch that
dipped forcibly, like the winchel rod, when Nostradamus held it over the
water, that it strained, as the hazel-rod does, almost to breaking; and
that at this invitation it is to be supposed that the spirit appears. The
incantation being completed and successful, the operator must be supposed
to set aside the winchel, and assume the pen, quaking with a solemn sense
of the spiritual presence. This fear was, Garencières says, to prevent
the puffing up of pride, as we read in Daniel, John, and the 4th of
Esdras.
Readers who take no interest in this, and are consequently weary by this
time of the length we have run into in the investigation, will leap over
what follows to get to the next quatrain.
M. le Pelletier refers to Ficinus’ translation of Jamblicus’ “De
Mysteriis Ægyptiorum,” 1607. He gives the Latin and French. I will merely
introduce here the English translation, as the book is of easy reference
to those who wish to examine further for themselves the sources which
Nostradamus had consulted, and from which he drew his summary exposition.
“The sibyl at Delphi received the god in two forms,—either by a
subtle and fiery spirit, which burst forth upon any one through
the crevice of some cavern, or else sitting on a brazen seat of
four or three feet in the inner shrine, dedicated to the god,
and where she was exposed on two sides to the divine influx,
whence she was irradiate with a divine light” (p. 66).
“Now, the prophetess of Branchus either sits upon a pillar, or
holds in her hand a rod bestowed by some deity, or moistens
her feet or the hem of her garment with water, or inhales the
vapour of water, and by these means is filled with divine
illumination, and, having obtained the deity, she prophesies.
By these practices she adapts herself to the god, whom she
receives from without” (p. 67).
“Porphyrius says that the art [or magic] is not to be despised
which, out of certain vapours due to fire under favourable
stellar influences, forms the images of gods spontaneously
appearing in the air, in a certain degree like the gods
themselves, and possessing a very similar efficacy” (p. 91).
“For amongst the demons there is one who is chief, and who
exercises influence at the moment of birth, and apportions to
each his demon (or familiar). After this there is present to
each one his own guardian, that develops a _cultus_ congruous
to his nature, and teaches him both his name and the most
suitable form of invocation (to bring him when required), and
this method is most congenial to the demons” (p. 171).
These forms of Jamblicus are analogous to those employed by Nostradamus;
but there the person prophesying wets the feet and fingers, whilst
according to our version of the quatrains it is the demon or spirit
applies them to himself: _Le Divin près s’assied_. In Jamblicus the one
who prophesies becomes possessed by entry of the spirit. Nostradamus
describes an external and visible presence which corresponds to
Porphyrius’ account of _deorum idola in aere_.
CORPOREAL DEMONS. [I. 59.]
_Century I.—Quatrain 42._
La dix Calendes d’Avril de faict gotique
Resuscité encor par gens malins:
Le feu estainct, assemblée diabolique
Cherchant les os du Damant et Pselin.[49]
_Translation._
The 10th of the Calends of April Gothic computation have
been again put in practice by sorcerers (_gens malins_). The
lights put out, the diabolic assembly searching for the Demon
[_Damant_ for _Démon_] treated of by Michael Psellus.
The _texte-type_ is most corrupt in this quatrain; for _Damant et Pselin_
read _Démon e or ex Pselin_, the demon as treated of by Psellus.
The scholium of M. le Pelletier on this is—The magical incantations,
which were successful formerly when wrought on the night of Good Friday,
were re-introduced into practice by sorcerers of skill on the 10th Calend
of April according to the ancient computation (_de faict gotique_). In
a note added he professes that the 10th Calend Old Style would be the
last day of March by the Gregorian, and he thinks it probable, that
Nostradamus here designates some particular year, when Good Friday fell
on the 31st of March. Garencières upon this notes that it falls on the
23rd of March, called Gothic, because adhered to by the northern nations
long after the Gregorian had been adopted at Rome. I do not see how the
10th Calend could ever fall on the 31st, nor indeed what the 31st has to
do with the matter. Those who are more familiar with such calculations
may perhaps explain. Like the witches’ sabbath, these diabolic meetings
were accompanied by the lewdest rites, as will at once be seen by the
following passage from Psellus, which I leave untranslated. It is from
the Latin translation of Psellus by Marsilius Ficinus, and will be found
in his collected works (ii. 884) in folio ed. 1641.
“Euchetæ et gnosci, ut dæmonia toto concipiant pectore,
nefanda sacrificia perpetrant. Conveniunt die quo passus est
Salvator,[50] vespere, statutum in locum, unà cum puellis sibi
notis, et post quædam sacra extinctis luminibus,[51] mistim
coëunt, sive cum sorore, sive cum filiâ, sive cum quâlibet”
(_Psellus_ as above, p. 884).
“There is a further kind of vaticination by a basin, by means
of which rustics frequently predict. Just as there is a mode
of predicting by means of the air and the leaves of trees, so
there is a kind of predictive power in the basin, known and
practised by the Assyrians, which has a great similarity to
this incarnation or coupling of demons with matter. Thus those
about to prophesy take a basin full of water, which attracts
the spirits moving stealthily in the depths (_dæmonibus
congruentem in profunda repentibus._) Le Pelletier translates
this, _approprié à l’usage des démons cachés au fond des eaux_.
The basin then, full of water, seems in sort to breathe (or
move) as with sounds (_s’il allait émettre des sons_); it
seems to me that the water was agitated with circular ripples,
as from some sound emitted below. Now, this water diffused
through the basin differs but little in kind from water out of
the basin, but yet it much excels it from a virtue imparted to
it by the charms [that have been droned over it], and which
have rendered it more apt to receive the spirit of prophecy.
For this description of spirit is tetchy and terrene, and
much under the influence of composite spells. When the water
begins to lend itself as the vehicle of sound, he [the spirit]
also presently gives out a thin reedy note [of satisfaction],
but devoid of meaning; and close upon that, whilst the water
is undulating, certain weak and peeping sounds whisper forth
predictions of the future. A spirit of this kind is vagrant
everywhere, for he is endowed with the solar pass [so that our
terrestrial atmosphere lies everywhere open to him], and that
order of spirits, in the work appointed to it, speaks at all
times with a subdued voice, that by its indistinct obscurity
it may be less easy to seize the falsehoods that it utters”
(Psellus as above, p. 885).
From the mode in which Psellus describes the matter in hand, it is very
perceptible that he was no great conjuror, and was merely speaking upon
hearsay and report. If lies were the business of the spirit, he would be
no prophet. Again, if he wished to circulate lies, he must still make
things clear enough to his votaries for them to circulate them and work
mischief thereby. Are we to suppose that, like an abandoned human being,
he had some sense of shame left still, and, like Lord John Russell, would
only tell as few lies as possible? Psellus’s demon is so foolish that he
would soon have been without any one to consult his shrine. He could not
have given a reason for his own conduct, in the past or present, and was
the last being that any one would resort to to anticipate intelligence
of the future. Still the procedure might have been somewhat as Psellus
describes it, although the reasons could not.
An historian of the fourth century, and a man of veracity, Marcellinus
has given us curious details of how prophetical tripods were considered
by the Romans in his day. It comes out quite naturally in the judicial
proofs investigating a conspiracy against the life of Valens the Emperor;
what we should call a state trial. The conspirators were put to the
torture, and as an item in the indictment the figure of a little table
becomes prominent, as to which the accused were questioned by the judges.
At last one of them, Hillarius, broken by pain, revealed the secret in
these words:
“Honoured judges, we constructed this unfortunate little
table that you see here after the fashion of the tripod
[or, more strictly, the cauldron[52]] at Delphi, with dark
incantations, out of branches of laurel; and with imprecations
of secret song, and numerous ceremonies repeated over daily,
we consecrated it by magic rites, till at last we put it in
motion. When it reached this capacity of movement, as often as
we wished to interrogate it by secret inquiry, we proceeded
thus.
“It was placed in the middle of a room (_in medio domûs_)
purified throughout by Arabian perfumes; a round dish was
simply laid upon it, formed of a composite material of many
metals. On the phlange of its outer round were skilfully
engraved the scriptile forms of the alphabet separated into
as many exactly measured spaces. Over this basin (or dish)
a man stood clothed in linen garments and shod with linen
socks, his head bound round with a turban-like tuft of hair,
and bearing a rod of vervain, the prospering plant. After
we had favourably conciliated the deity, who is the giver
of all presage, with duly formulated charms and ceremonial
knowledge, he communicated a gentle movement to a ring that
hung suspended over the basin.... This was tied up by an
exceedingly fine Carpathian thread, which had been initiated
with mystical observances. This ring, moving by little leaps
or jumps, so as to alight upon the distinct intervals with the
separate letters inscribed, each in its compartment to itself,
gives out in heroic verse answers suitable to the inquiries
made, comprehended perfectly in number and measure; such as
are called Pythic, or those delivered by the oracles of the
Branchidæ.
“To us inquiring who should succeed to the present empire,
because it had been already mentioned that it would be one
entirely suitable [to our aim and purpose], the leaping ring
had glanced upon the two syllables THEO. With the last addition
of a letter [that is, D], a man present exclaimed, ‘THEODORUM,’
the fatal necessity of the portent indicating as much.
Nothing further was sought upon this head; for it was agreed
amongst us that this was the individual we wanted” (_Ammianus
Marcellinus_, Rerum Gestarum, xxix. 1).
In this case the ambiguity of the oracle is due to the precipitance of
the inquirers. The oracle was true as far as they allowed it to proceed,
but had they waited to spell it out they would have learned that the
name was not THEOD_orus_, but THEOD_osius_ the Great, who was to be the
successor to Valens.
This is an authentic passage of high interest. It shows considerable
analogy with the table-turning of the moderns; it also gives insight
into singular and elaborate processes of divination by magic as being
frequently practised at Rome in the fourth century. Clearly the Pagans
had no notion in that century that oracles had at all finally ceased on
a Good Friday in the first century, or that Pan, the god of rumour, was
dead. The sun still shone to them as the Apollo of prophecy, and they
still sought presage of a spirit who was made free of the solar order
(_qui solarem ordinem est sortitus_).
HISTORICAL FRAGMENTS.
I shall now give a few detached historical fragments that relate to
France, commencing with the Peace of Cateau-Cambresis, 1559, and running
down to the death of Louis XV., 1774, in chronological order, just as M.
le Pelletier has found the counterpart to lie embedded in the quatrains
of Nostradamus, in a fashion seemingly interpretable to him. This, for
any but French readers, will probably be sufficient to indicate the style
and value of the presages enveloped in the strange and fatidical diction
of the quatrains. I doubt not but that, by original research instituted
and by careful re-reading of the text throughout, a good many more of the
mysterious stanzas might be unravelled and elucidated; also by collation
of all that has been written by commentators on our author, a good deal
of light might be thrown upon what they have done, even where their own
interpretation has fallen short of clearness. All that my book purposes
to accomplish is,—at least for England,—to establish, without doubt,
and at once, for all future time, that Nostradamus is no impostor, but,
when rightly understood and unlocked, a very wonderful anticipator of
events to happen hereafter; and, farther than this, that his works are,
to all intents and purposes, the most startling oracles ever put on
paper by mortal man not professing divine inspiration. From immemorial
time instances of human prescience have occasionally been manifested.
The whole human race has an ardent and ingrain desire to search into and
anticipate futurity. Very few individuals, however, have from time to
time been able to gratify and keep alive their passion in this respect.
But no one has done so in a degree that at all sets him on a par with
Nostradamus in the felicitous and reiterated coruscations whereby he has
anticipated the more prominent points and epochs of time Future; and
sometimes in minuteness he even mentions by name some individual who
emerges though it be but for an instant from the general obscurity of his
life.
THE PEACE OF CATEAU-CAMBRESIS (APRIL 3, 1559). [I. 71.]
_Century IX.—Quatrain 52._
La paix s’approche d’un costé, et la guerre
Oncques[53] ne fut la poursuitte si grande:
Plaindre hômes, femmes, sang innocent par terre,
Et ce sera de France a[54] toute bande.
_Translation._
Peace approaches on one side, and [as to] war
Never was the pursuit of it so great:
Men and women [have cause] to weep innocent blood on earth;
All through France it shall be from end to end.
The peace was that concluded with Spain at Cateau-Cambresis, whilst the
war, carried on with such hot pursuit, was the civil conflict that raged
between Romanist and Calvinist. This it was made men and women lament
the blood spilt upon the earth in all parts of France, from north to
south.
DEATH OF HENRI II. (JULY 10, 1559). [I. 72.]
_Century I.—Quatrain 35._
Le lyon jeune le vieux surmontera
En champ bellique par singulier duelle:
Dans cage d’or[55] les yeux lui crevera,
Deux classes[56] une,[57] puis mourir, mort cruelle.
_Translation._
The young lion shall overcome the old
On the field of war in single combat [duelle];
He will pierce his eyes in a cage of gold.
This is the first of two loppings, then he dies a cruel death.
Montgomery, who at the moment of the narrative bore the name of Captain
Coryes (Garencières, p. 25), afterwards became Earl of Montgomery,
overthrew Henri II. (_le vieux lion_) in the tournay-lists or duel, and
pierced him above the eye through the gilt visor of his helmet. This is
the first of the two blows that will destroy the dynastic tree of the
house of Valois. Henri II., wounded mortally, shall be the first to die a
violent death; whilst his son, Henri III., will be the second, who fell
by the hand of Jacques Clément.
August 1. 1589.
This is a very celebrated quatrain. It is found in the earliest edition
of the quatrains published at Lyons in 1555, containing merely 300
quatrains. It lifted Nostradamus into celebrity at once. He had applied
it to Henri II. several years before it happened, and had even announced
it as a prediction to the King himself. He was well known to Henri II.,
to whom he dedicated the last three Centuries, in a long and curious
epistle, which we have already given in full. The King seems to have
had infinite confidence in Nostradamus, for he let him draw the royal
horoscope, as well as that of his two children, in 1556.
The story of this is curious, as given by Guynaud in his “Concordance
des Prophéties de Nostradamus,” 1712,[58] pp. 86-91. Henri II., it
would seem, proclaimed a tournament in the Rue St. Antoine, the site of
the Bastille, then in the country, for July 1, 1559, in honour of the
marriage of his daughter Elizabeth of France with Philip II. of Spain. He
listed himself as one against all comers. The joust being nearly over and
the sun setting, the Duc de Savoie begged him to quit the running, as his
side was already victorious; but the King wanted to break another lance
over it, and commanded the young Comte de Montgommeri, captain of his
Scotch Guard, to run a tilt in conclusion. He excused himself, but the
King insisted and grew angry. Of course the young man then obeyed, put
spurs to his horse, and struck the King upon the throat, below the vizor.
His lance shivered, and the butt raising the vizor, a splinter wounded
the King above the right eye, cutting several of the veins of the _pia
mater_. The King swooned. He lived on, however, for ten days in terrible
agony, as foretold in the prophecy, _Deux classes une, puis mourir, mort
cruelle_. Nostradamus styles both of them lions, as they both fought
under that device. The King wore a gilt helmet, so that the _cage d’or_
was literally fulfilled.