character, 221.
Field-rats prosecuted, 78-80.
Formula against bloody-flux, 215;
against epilepsy, 215.
Formulary of malediction used by priests, 81, 82.
Gnosticism springs up, 38.
God, enthroned in the Empyrean, 1;
associates with man, 8-9.
Gregory IX. exhorts to a crusade against the Stedinghs, 174.
Gregory the Great, mentioned, 44, 60;
forbade the abrogation of pagan festivities, 160.
Heaven of crystal, next beneath Empyrean,--_primum mobile_; of fixed
stars, devoid of weight, 2.
Hell, becomes a place of punishment, 11;
remains after final conflagration, 26.
Henricus Cornelius Agrippa ab Nettesheim, on God as the source of all
power, 3, 4;
is not chosen to represent the magician in the Faust-legend, 221.
Heretics of Arras, their belief, 60.
Hermes Trismegistus, transmuted whatever he chose to gold, 115.
Hincmar, archb. of Rheims, propounds a remedy against witch-knots, 216.
Hippocrates, mentioned, 71, 72.
Historical development of Middle-age Cosmic Philosophy, 28-51.
History, a spiritual comedy, 23.
_Homunculus philosophicus_, how produced, 132, 133.
Horst's Demonomagie quoted, 199.
Houses of the planets, 134.
"Hubertus-bands" and "Hubertus-keys," 69.
Images, their miraculous properties, 67, 68.
Incense appropriate for Mars, 139.
"_Incubi_" and "_succubi_," 167.
Inevitable causation, not admitted in the Middle Age Cosmic philosophy,
4.
Isis, secrets of entrusted to the sons of Ham, 114.
Jacob's ladder, structure of the universe likened to, 6.
Jamblichus, practices secret arts, to outrival Christian magi, 40.
Jean Bodin, ascribes witchcraft to Zoroaster, 45.
John of Salisbury upon witch-festivals, 173.
Judaico-Alexandrian philosophy blooms, 38.
Jupiter belonging to the second of the planetary spaces, 2.
Knowledge of highest truths revealed to man, 20.
Lucifer, prince of Seraphim, 9;
revolts, and wars with Michael, 10;
is conquered, is permitted to tempt man, 10;
transformed into an angel of light, 12;
triumphs, 14.
Luther, on Satanic malice as the cause of accidents, 24, 25;
esteems highly "Deutsche Theologie," 26;
Tischreden quoted, 168;
referred to, 199.
Lycanthropy of the Middle Ages, 205-207.
"Magia Divina," quoted 130-133.
Magic, of the Church, 51-94;
what enters into all employment of it, 53, 54;
white and black magic, celestial and diabolical, 54;
of the Church defined, 92.
--Magic of the Learned, 95-158;
is derived from various sources, 116;
first principle of, 128.
--Magic of the People, 158-224;
black magic and devil worship, 164.
Magician, the learned of the 15th century, 100;
his apartments described, 105, 108, 110;
explains his science, 112-129;
performs an incantation, 129-155.
Malice of the devil, causes unforeseen accidents, 24, 25.
Man, a microcosm; must dwell on earth, 7;
at first happy, 8.
Mandrake, superstitions concerning, 201.
Manicheism, new form of dualism; advances against Europe; finds a
follower in Augustine, 43.
Marathon, Salamis and Plataea really battle-fields of a religious war,
35.
Mars, situate in the third of the planetary spaces, 2.
Matter, devoid of force and all quality, 3.
May-bugs excommunicated, 75.
Men are often terrified into an alliance with the devil, 25.
Mercury, path of in planetary world, 2.
Middle Ages, Cosmic Philosophy of, 1-28;
historical origin of, 28-55, 94.
Miracles, defined, 4.
Mithras mysteries, contain a copy, by anticipation, of the sacrament of
baptism, 57;
imitate other mysteries of the Church, 58, 60.
Moon, path of, 2.
"_Mus exenteratus_," etc., quoted, 60.
Native spirits popularly believed to inhabit land, air and water, 202.
Nature, knowledge of, same as a knowledge of the angels, 5.
Neoplatonism arises, 40.
Nine revolving heavens, 1.
Nork's "Sitten und Gebraeuche der Deutschen," etc., quoted, 202.
Number 72, its significance, 143, 144;
number 488, 147.
Origen, attempts to unite belief and thought, 41;
rejects the doctrine of eternal punishment, 43.
Origin of the names of the days of the week, 135, 136.
Ormuzd and Ahriman, are the real adversaries repelled at Marathon, 36;
author of _white_ magic, 54.
Pentecost, its gifts transmitted, 91.
Peter de Abano, author of an important question, 97.
_Perpetuum mobile naturae_, method of producing, 130, 131.
Pierre Delancre complains against witch-knots, 216.
Philosophy, system of possible within the Church, 20;
adherents of the scholastic may use Aristotle's dialectics, 21.
Planetary world, next beneath that of fixed stars, 2;
consisting of seven heavens, 2.
Planets guided by angels, 3;
influence the elements and man, 134, 135.
Plotinus, tries to restore Neoplatonism, 40.
Pope, feudal lord of emperors, 18;
determines the true inductions of philosophy, 21;
Sergius III., 63;
Urban Vitus, 65.
Pope John XXII., complains that his life is endangered by sorcerers,
177.
Pope Innocent VIII., puts forth a bull against the spread of sorcery,
178.
Popular maxims of superstition, 208-211.
Power, from a spiritual source only, 3;
communicated to the heavens and the earth by angels, 3.
Power, order of angels, guide the stars and planets, 5.
Principalities, Archangels, and Angels, the third and lowest hierarchy,
hold supremacy over terrestrial things, 5, 6.
Principalities, part of the lowest hierarchy of angels, guardian spirits
of nations, 6.
Proclus, last Neoplatonician, 44.
Pythagoras, glorified as fit to rank with Christ in miraculous gifts,
40;
believed the universe founded on numbers, 124.
Rain-processions in the Middle Ages, 74.
Reason, darkened by apostacy, 13.
"Recognitiones divi Clementis ad Jacob.," quoted, 165.
Reformation, retains somewhat of the Church-magic, 92.
Relics, their magical use, 66.
Remigius, ascribes witchcraft to Zoroaster, 45.
Renaissance, overthrew the darkness and superstition of the Middle Ages,
222-223.
Saints, intercession of, more effective than that of Seraphim, 17;
not disturbed by misery of the damned, 27;
have control over various diseases, 69.
Satan, the Judaized Ahriman, 35.
Saturn, belonging to the first of the planetary spaces, 2.
Scale of the Holy Tetrad (Table I.), 123.
_Schemhamphoras_, or God's mystical names, 144, 146.
_Scholastici errantes_, 220.
Science the, of the Greeks is rational, originates logic and geometry;
of the Middle Ages is _magic_, 30.
Scotus Erigena, mentioned, 44.
Seraphim, Cherubim and Thrones, the first hierarchy, and nearest God, 5.
Simon Magus, legend of his discomfiture by St. Peter, 165.
Sprenger, author of Malleus Malificarum, ascribes the origin of
witchcraft to Zoroaster, 45.
Stedinghs persecuted, 174.
_Summa Theologica_, quoted on the delectation of the redeemed upon
seeing the misery of the damned, 28.
Sun, belonging to the middle space of planetary world, 2.
Superstitious prognostics of disease and death, 212-216.
Synodal decree of Ancyra, 171.
Table of correspondences between microcosmos and things on earth, and
the planets, 127.
Tekfael, name of the demon summoned, 147, 153.
Terrestrial things, images of the celestial, 6;
are composed of the coarsest matter, 6;
are all under the control of special angels, 7;
are also influenced by stars, planets and archetypes, 7.
Theologie der Thatsachen wider die Theologie der Rhetorik (A. F. C. H.
Vilmar, 1857) quoted, 48-50.
Thomas Aquinas, on the acquiescence of the saints in the punishment of
the lost, 28;
on the power of demons, 73.
Universe, a vast lyre, 7;
an unbroken harmony, 9;
divided between Good and Evil, 11.
University of 15th century described, 96-98.
Vampirism, 207.
Venus, path of in planetary world, 2.
Vilmar, Neo-Lutheran, would restore to the clergy their mediaeval
prerogatives, 48-50.
Virgil quoted, 205, 216.
Von Goerres, attempts to restore the belief in vampirism, 207.
Witch-hammer, contains directions for the judge in witch-trials, 90,
178-195.
Witches' Sabbath, supposed origin of, 170.
Witch-knots, 216.
Zoroaster, the reputed founder of magic science; and by some believed
the author of witchcraft, 45;
his religion allows evil to disappear in course of time, and promises
a final restoration of all things, 46.
Zoroaster and Plato's systems blended, 37.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Henricus Cornelius Agrippa ab Nettesheim: "De occulta
Philosophia."--I., XIII.
[2] Henricus Cornelius Agrippa ab Nettesheim: "De occulta
Philosophia."--I., XIII.
[3] _Ibidem._
[4] This passage, directed against the ruler of Assyria, was already
interpreted by the early fathers as having reference to Satan. Thus
Lucifer, the Latin translation for Morning Star, came to be a name for the
prince of darkness.
[5] Luke x. 18.
[6] "De Contemptu Mundi sive de Miseria Humanae Conditionis," a little book
written about 1200, by the afterwards Pope Innocent III.
[7] The words of Luther, who, in addition to his dualistic belief, was a
genuine son of this same Middle Age, though the destroyer of its
autocratic faith.
[8] As such,--as perishable and unreal, are all evil things regarded by an
unknown author in the Middle Ages. In his beautiful opuscule "Deutsche
Theologie," he says among other things: "Now some one may ask, 'Since we
must love every thing, must we also love sin?' The answer is, no; for when
we say every thing, we only mean every thing that is good. Every thing
that exists is good by virtue of its existence. The devil is good in so
far as he exists. In this sense, there is nothing evil in existence. But
it is a sin to wish, desire or love any thing else than God. Now all
things are essentially in God, and more essentially in God than in
themselves; therefore are they all good in their real essence."--The
little work from which the above is quoted, is the expression of a deep
and pious soul, struggling to master the dualism which fettered his age.
It is remarkable that Luther was not more strongly influenced by its
spirit, although he confesses that "Next to the Bible and St. Augustine I
have found no book from which I have learned more."
[9] See the work "Summa Theologica" (supplementum ad tertiam partem,
quaest. 94) by the most prominent and most influential among the
theologians of the Middle Ages, Thomas Aquinas. It is there said: "Ut
beatitudo sanctorum eis magis complaceat et de ea uberiores gratias Deo
agant, datur eis ut poenam impiorum perfecte videant.... Beati, qui
erunt in gloria, nullam compassionem ad damnatos habebunt.... Sancti de
poenis impiorum gaudebunt, considerando in eis divinae justitiae ordinem
et suam liberationem de qua gaudebunt."--With this may be compared the
following execrable effusion of another theologian: "Beati coelites non
tantum non cognatorum sed nec parentum sempiternis suppliciis ad ullam
miserationem flectentur. Imo vero laetabuntur justi, cum viderint
vindictam; manus lavabunt in sanguine peccatorum."
[10] Tertullian.
[11] This has been denied in so far as the original teachings of Zoroaster
are concerned, but is confirmed by a passage in Aristotle (Metaphys., I.,
XIV., c. 4).
[12] A. F. Ch. Vilmar: "Theologie der Thatsachen wider die Theologie der
Rhetorik" (Marburg, 1857).
[13] Thus, for instance, the red lustre of copper was supposed to indicate
that it was connected with Mars, which shines with a reddish light.
[14] "Non baptisatis parvulis nemo promittat inter damnationem regnumque
coelorum quietis vel felicitatis cujuslibet atque ubilibet quasi medium
locum; hoc enim eis etiam haeresis Pelagiana promisit" (Augustinus: De
Anima et Ejus Origine, 1. I., c. IX). In one of his letters Augustine
declares that even if the parents hurry to the priest, and he likewise
hasten to baptize the child, but find it dead before it has obtained the
sacrament, it is nevertheless then doomed to be eternally tormented with
the damned, and to blaspheme the name of God.
[15] All these are found, in connection with baptism, in heathen
mysteries.
[16] Extract from the formula given at the council of Rome, A. D. 1059, to
Berengar of Tours, to which he was forced to swear under penalty of death.
[17] The wafer substituted in the twelfth century for bread was called the
host.
[18] The discovery made in our days by the Danish theologian Martensens
that the food obtained in the Supper of our Lord is not for the soul only,
but also for the body,--for the nourishment of our ascension-body, is not
really new; the pagan initiated into the Mithras mysteries was taught that
the consecrated bread and wine, being assimilated into his flesh and
blood, gave immortality to his corporeal being. Like presuppositions
produce in different times like ideas.
An important question in the Middle Ages and one which had been already
argued with great heat from the time of Petrus Lombardus until the
seventeenth century, is propounded as follows: Has a rat which has eaten
of the host thereby partaken of Christ's body? In connection with this it
was further asked: How is a rat which has eaten of Christ's body to be
treated,--ought it to be killed or honored? Ought the sacrament to be
venerated even in the stomach of the rat? If some of the consecrated bread
is found in the stomach of a rat, is it a duty to eat it? What must be
done if immediately after partaking of the sacrament one is attacked by
vomiting? When a rat can eat the host, can not the devil also do it?--One
of the last products of these important investigations is a book published
in Tuebingen in 1593, entitled: "_Mus exenteratus, hoc est tractatus valde
magistralis super quaestione quadam theologica spinosa et multum subtili_,"
_etc._
[19] During the period of political reaction in 1815, when Schlegel and de
Maistre praised the Middle Ages as man's era of bliss, and Goerres sought
to restore to credence during the "state period of enlightenment" all the
forgotten ghost and vampire stories, the clergy of Brussels were
celebrating with processions and other solemnities the anniversary of this
persecution of the Jews in Namur.
At the synod in A. D. 1099 a proclamation was issued forbidding priests to
enter into any servile relations with laymen, because it were shameful if
the most holy hands which prepared the flesh and blood of Almighty God
should serve the unconsecrated laity. The famous orator Bourdaloue
requested that greater homage should be paid to the priest than to the
holy Virgin, because God had been incarnated in her bosom only once, but
was in the hands of the priest daily, as often as the mass was read.
[20] The oldest Christian art in which the dying spirit of antiquity yet
reveals itself, represented Jesus as a shepherd youth carrying a lamb upon
his bosom. Many a one could only turn away sadly from the beaming world of
Olympus to the new Christian ideal, and when they must needs so do, they
would fain transfer to the new "_puer redemptor_" the mild beauty of the
former youthful mediator, Dionysus Zagreus. In the hymns, still preserved
to us, of Synesius, who combined in one person the bishop and the Greek
who still longs for wisdom and beauty (doubtless known to many of our
readers by Kingsley's novel of Hypatia), this sadness is in wonderful
harmony with Christian devotion. With the ruin of the antique world, this
longing as well as the capability of satisfying it ceased. The material
symbol obtained thereafter a more prominent place. If the Phoenicians
and Canaanites represented their god corporeally as the powerful steer,
the Christians chose the patient and inoffensive lamb as the type of
theirs. The Council of Constantinople in A. D. 692 confirmed this
lamb-symbol. As Aaron had made a golden calf, Pope Sergius III. procured a
lamb to be made of gold and ivory. All who rebelled against its worship
were treated as disorderly and heretical. In the time of Charlemagne one
of them, Bishop Claudius of Turin, from whom the Waldenses derive their
origin, complained: "_Isti perversorum dogmatum auctores agnos vivos
volunt vorare et in pariete pictos adorare._"
[21] Pope Urban Vitus presented an _agnus Dei_ to the Byzantine Emperor.
An accompanying note described its wonderful powers in the following
monkish-Latin hexameters:--
_Balsamus et munda cera cum chrismatis unda
Conficiunt agnum, quod munus do tibi magnum
Fonte velut natum per mystica sanctificatum.
Fulgura desursum depellit, et omne malignum
Peccatum frangit, ut Christi sanguis et angit.
Praegnans servatur, simul et partus liberatur.
Dona refert dignis, virtutem destruit ignis.
Portatus munde de fluctibus eripit undae._
[22] As late as 1784 a statute was issued by Carl Theodor, Elector of
Pfalz, referring to the magic power of St. Hubert-relics, and forbidding
the employment of "worldly" remedies against the bite of mad dogs.
[23] In the year 1240 a large rain-procession was held in Luettich. Three
times repeated it failed of all effect, "because in the supplication of
all saints God's mother had been forgotten." In a new procession "_Salve
regina_" was therefore sung, and the rain immediately came down with such
violence that the devout procession was dispersed.--The clergy sometimes,
in order to produce rain, would lead a donkey before the gate of the
church, hang the litany about his neck, put a wafer in his mouth, and then
bury the animal alive.
[24] Especially was the Church of the Middle Ages rich in awful
formularies of malediction, testifying to an enormous brutalization of
thought and feeling. A single specimen of these formularies will be more
than sufficient to illustrate:--
"By the might, power and authority of God, the Almighty Father, of the Son
and of the Holy Ghost and in the name of the Holy Virgin the mother of our
Lord Jesus Christ, by the holy angels, archangels, St. Michael and St.
John the Baptist, in the name of the holy apostle Peter and all the
apostles, in the name of the holy Stephen and all the holy martyrs, and
St. Adelgunda and all the holy virgins, and of all the saints in heaven
and on earth to whom power is given to bind and loose,--we curse, execrate
and exclude from the mother Church through the bond of malediction (here
follows the name of the persons). May their children be orphaned; may they
be cursed upon the field, cursed in the city, in the forest, in their
houses and barns, in their chamber and their bed, in the town-hall, in the
village, on land and sea; may they be cursed in the church, in the
churchyard, in the court-room, on the public square and in war; whether
they be talking, sleeping, waking, eating or drinking, whether they be
going or resting, or doing any other thing, let them be accursed in soul
and body, reason and all their senses: cursed be their progeny, cursed be
the fruit of their land, cursed be all their limbs, head, nose, mouth,
teeth, throat, eyes, and eyelashes, brain, larynx, tongue, breast, lungs,
liver, legs, and arms, skin and hair; cursed be every thing living and
moving in them from head to foot, etc. I conjure thee, Lucifer, and all
your crew, by the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, by the incarnation
and birth of Christ; I conjure thee by the power and the virtue of all
saints, that thou never leave them in quiet, night or day, until thou have
brought them to ruin, destroyed them by water, or led them to the gallows,
or caused them to be torn by wild beasts, or their throat to be cut by
enemies, or their bodies to be destroyed by fire," etc., etc.
[25] A biblical ground for ordeals was found in Numbers v. 12-28.
[26] The "Witch-hammer" will be more fully described hereafter. The
student of history should not neglect this volume, which is the ripest
fruit of Catholic dualism, and clearly shows the results to which it
tends.
[27] "Gott in der Geschichte," III.
[28] Yet in the days of Erasmus of Rotterdam the theologians were making
great ado over this knotty problem.
[29] This confession Cornelius Agrippa makes in his "Occult Philosophy."
Theophrastus Paracelsus and others were less modest.
[30] Thus reasoned, as late as the middle of the sixteenth century,
Borrichius (Olaf Borch), who was professor in chemistry at the University
of Copenhagen and wrote a book upon the wisdom of the Egyptian Hermes.
[31] Agrippa: "De Occulta Philosophia," 1. I., c. 24.
[32] We have found in a "_Magia Divina_" the following directions for
accomplishing a _perpetuum mobile naturae_, the efficacy of which we leave
for the reader to decide.
"During the twelve nights after Christmas 1-1/2 measures of dew are
collected from fruit-trees, and preserved well enclosed. In the month of
March dew is again collected from both fruit-trees and meadows and is
preserved in another phial. Dew collected in May is poured in a third and
rain of a thunderstorm during the summer in a fourth. Thereupon the
contents of the four phials are mixed and one measure of it is poured into
a great transparent glass retort where, well covered, it must remain a
month until it becomes foul. Put it then over fire and subject to heat of
the second degree. When sufficiently distilled a substance thick as honey
is left. In this residue are poured four grains of astral tincture. The
mixture is exposed to a heat of the first degree, by which it is converted
into a thick, jet-black lump which again is dissolved, forming below an
ink-like fluid, and above a vapor, in which many colors and figures are
seen. These soon disappear, and every thing is changed into water, which
begins to turn green, and green palaces, constantly enlarging, and
mountains and lovely pastures appear, while the water is diminished more
and more. When now you find that no more dew rises from the earth within
the glass, take the water which you received from the distillation, mix
with it a drachm of astral tincture and pour an ounce of this mixture into
the glass bulb. Then every thing begins again to live and grow. Add every
month an ounce of this mixture. If then the glass ball is well closed, and
is not stirred, a vapor gradually arises, and is condensed into two
shining stars, like the sun and the moon, and like the latter, one of
these stars waxes and wanes; and all the phenomena of nature, thunder,
lightning, hail, rain, snow and dew, will appear in your glass ball as in
the real world around you. All this will happen if you keep the great
Creator before your eyes and in your heart, and if you conceal from the
wicked world this great secret."