_How Faustus was asked a question concerning the Spirits that vex men_
That is most true (saith he to Faustus) concerning the Stars and
Planets: but I pray you in what kind or manner do the spirits use or
vex men so little by day, and so greatly by night? Doctor Faustus
answered: because the spirits are by God forbidden the light, their
dwelling is in darkness, and the clearer the Sun shineth, the further
the Spirits have their abiding from it, but in the night when it is
dark, they have their familiarity and abiding near unto us men. For
although in the night we see not the Sun, yet the brightness thereof
so lighteneth the first moving of the firmament as it doth that on
earth in the day, by which reason we are able to see the Stars and
Planets in the night, even so the rays of the Sun piercing upwards
into the firmament, the Spirits abandon the place, and so come near
us on earth in the darkness, filling our heads with heavy dreams and
fond fantasies, with screeching and crying in many deformed shapes:
as sometimes when men go forth without light, there falleth to them a
fear, that their hair standeth on end, so many start in their sleep
thinking there is a Spirit by him, gropeth or feeleth for him, going
round about the house in his sleep, and many such-like fantasies:
and all this is for because that in the night the Spirits are more
familiarly by us than we are desirous of their company, and so they
carry us, blinding us and plaguing us more than we are able to
perceive.