Book I.

Therefore, original sin was effectively bred from the concupiscence of the flesh, but occasioned only by the apple being eaten, and the admonition despised : but the stimulative to concupiscence was placed in the dissuaded tree, and that occult lustful property radically inserted and implanted in it. But when Satan (besides his hope , and the deflowering of the virgin, nothing hindering of it) saw that man was not taken out of the way, according to the forewarning (for he knew not that the Son of God had constituted himself a surety, before the Father, for man) he, indeed, looked at the vile, corrupted, and degenerated nature of man, and saw that a power was withdrawn from him of uniting himself to the God of infinite majesty, and began greatly to rejoice. That joy was of short duration, for, by and by, he likewise knew that marriage was ratified by Heaven — that the divine goodness yet inclined to man — and that Satan’s own fallacies and deceits were thus deceived : hence conjecturing that the Son of God was to restore every defect of contagion, and, therefore, perhaps, to be incarnated. He then put himself to work how, or in what manner, he should defile the stock that was to be raised up by matrimony with a mortal soul, so that he might render every conception of God in vain : therefore he stirred up not only his fratricides, and notoriously wicked persons, that there might be evil abounding at all times ; but he pro- cured that Atheism might arise, and that, together with Heathenism, it might daily increase, whereby indeed, if he could not hinder the co-knitting of the immortal mind with the sensitive soul, he might, at least, by destroying the law of Nature, bring man unto a level with himself under infernal punishment : but his special care and desire was to expunge totally the immortal mind out of the stock of posterity.
Therefore he (the Devil) stirs up, to this day, detestable copulations in Atheistical libertines : but he saw from thence, that nothing but brutish or savage monsters proceeded, to be abhorred by the very parents themselves ; and that the copulation with women was far more plausible to men ; and that by this method the generation of men should constantly continue ; for he endea- voured to prevent the hope of restoring a remnant, that is, to hinder the incarnation of the Son of God ; therefore he attempted, by an application of
active
Chap. I. NATURAL MAGIC. 23
active things, to frame the seed of man according to his own accursed desire ; which, when he had found vain and impossible for him to do, he tried again whether an imp or witch might not be fructified by sodomy ; and when this did not fully answer his intentions every way, and he saw that of an ass and a horse a mule was bred, which was nearer a-kin to his mother than his father ; likewise that of a coney and dormouse being the father, a true coney was bred, being distinct from his mother, only having a tail like the dormouse ; he declined these feats, and betook himself to others worthy, indeed, only of the subtile craft of the Prince of Darkness.
Therefore Satan instituted a connexion of the seed of man with the seed and in the womb of a junior witch, or sorceress, that he might exclude the dispositions unto an immortal mind from such a new, polished conception : and afterwards came forth an adulterous and lascivious generation of Faunii, Satyrs, Gnomes, Nymphs, Sylphs, Driades, Hamodriades, Neriads, Mermaids, Syrens, Sphynxes, Monsters, &c., using the constellations, and disposing the seed of man for such like monstrous prodigious generations.
And, seeing the Faunii and Nymphs of the woods were preferred before the others in beauty, they afterwards generated their offspring amongst themselves,, and at length began wedlocks with men, feigning that, by these copulations, they should obtain an immortal soul for them and their offspring ; but this happened through the persuasions and delusions of Satan to admit these monsters to carnal copulation, which the ignorant were easily persuaded to ; and therefore these Nymphs are called Succubii : although Satan afterwards committed worse, frequently transchanging himself, by assuming the persons of both Incubii and Succubii, in both sexes ; but they conceived not a true young by the males, except the Nymphs alone. The which, indeed, seeing the sons of God (that is, men) had now, without distinction, and in many places, taken to be their wives, God was determined to blot out the whole race begotten by these infernal and detestable marriages, through a deluge of waters, that the intent of the evil spirit might be rendered frustrate.
Of which monsters before mentioned, I will here give a striking example from Helmont : for he says, a merchant of Aigina, a countryman of his,
sailing
NATURAL MAGIC.
24 NATURAL MAGIC. Book I.
sailing various times unto the Canaries, was asked by Helmont for his serious judgment about certain creatures, which the mariners frequently brought home from the mountains, as often as they went, and called them Tude-squils ; * for they were dried dead carcasses, almost three-footed, and so small that a boy might easily carry one of them upon the palm of his hand, and they were of an exact human shape ; but their whole dead carcass was clear or transparent as any parchment, and their bones flexible like gristles ; against the sun, also, their bowels and intestine were plainly to be seen ; which thing I, by Spaniards there born, knew to be true. I considered that, to this day, the destroyed race of the Pygmies were there ; for the Almighty would render the expectations of the evil spirit, supported by the abominable actions of mankind, void and vain ; and he has, therefore, manifoldly saved us from the craft and subtilty of the Devil, unto whom eternal punishments are due, to his extreme and perpetual confusion, unto the everlasting sanctifying of the Divine Name.
CHAP. II.
OF THE WONDERS OF NATURAL MAGIC, DISPLAYED IN A VARIETY OF SYMPATHETIC AND OCCULT OPERATIONS THROUGHOUT THE FAMILIES OF ANIMALS, PLANTS, METALS, AND STONES, TREATED OF MISCELLANEOUSLY.
THE wonders of Animal Magic we mean fully to display under the title of Magnetism. But here we hasten to investigate by what means, instruments, and effects, we must apply actives to passives, to the producing of rare and uncommon effects ; whether by actions , amulets , alligations and suspensions — or rings , papers , unctions , suffumigations , allurements , sorceries, enchantments , images, lights, sounds, or the like- Therefore, to begin with things more simple : — If any one shall, with an entire new knife, cut asunder a lemon, using words expressive of hatred, contumely, or dislike, against any individual,
Stude-quills, or Stew’d quills.
the
Chap. II. NATURAL MAGIC. 25
the absent party, though at an unlimited distance, feels a certain inexpres- sible and cutting anguish of the heart, together with a cold chilliness and failure throughout the body ; — likewise of living animals, if a live pigeon be cut through the heart, it causes the heart of the party intended to affect with a sudden failure ; likewise fear is induced by suspending the magical image of a man by a single thread ; — also, death and destruction by means similar to these ; and all these from a fatal and magical sympathy.
Likewise of the virtues of simple animals, as well as manual operations, of which we shall speak more anon : — The application of hare’s fat pulls out a thorn ; — likewise any one may cure the tooth-ache with the stone that is in the head of the toad ; also, if any one shall catch a living frog before sun-rise, and he or she spits in the mouth of the frog, will be cured of an asthmatic consumption ; — likewise the right or left eye of the same animal cures blind- ness ; and the fat of a viper cures a bite of the same. Black hellebore easeth the head-ache, being applied to the head, or the powder snuffed up the nose in~a moderate quantity. Coral is a well-known preservative against witchcraft and poisons, which if worn now, in this time, as much round children’s necks as usual, would enable them to combat many diseases which their tender years are subjected to, and to which, with fascinations, they often fall a victim. I know how to compose coral amulets, or talismans, which, if suspended even by a thread, shall (God assisting) prevent all harms and accidents of violence from fire, or water, or witchcraft, and help them to withstand all their diseases.
Paracelsus and Helmont both agree, that in the toad, although so irreverent to the sight of man, and so noxious to the touch, and of such strong violent antipathy to the blood of man, I say, out of this hatred Divine Providence hath prepared us a remedy against manifold diseases most inimical to man’s nature. The toad hath a natural aversion to man ; and this sealed image, or idea of hatred, he carries in his head, eyes, and most powerfully throughout his whole body : now that the toad may be highly prepared for a sympathetic remedy against the plague or other disorders, such as the ague, falling sicknesses, and various others ; and that the terror of us, and natural inbred hatred may the more strongly be imprinted and higher ascend in the toad, we must hang him up