of Witches
79
were formerly in Africa and Italy certain families which, by praising people, caused them to die, thereby proving themselves altogether devilish. Yet other strange matters do they accomplish by their uttered spells. To go to the Sabbat, they place a staff between their legs and say these words: White staff, black staff, etc. The Ephesians, by means of certain magic words which they used, brought all their undertakings to a successful issue. Pythagoras enchanted the eagle with his words. It was by the force of her words that Medea seized the moon from the sky and brought it down to the earth. The great magician Mahomet did likewise, and put the moon in his sleeve: El-phurkan.at least he himself wrote that he did so.
Yet, in spite of all this, who will believe that mere words have the power to hurt? For my part I am of opinion that they are no more than a symbol of the pact between the witch and Satan; for it is certain that words have no other purpose than to denote the thing for which they were ordained and to express the passions of the soul and the affections of the spirit. Besides, if words had the power to kill, they would do so when uttered by anyone who was not a witch. And again, of what possible effect could be the strange unknown words used by witches: such as Gaber siloc fandu, which they say when they wish to prevent a chicken, whose head has been pierced with a knife, from dying? Or Malaton malatas dinor, which they use to prevent one from shooting with an arquebus? There are countless others which I purposely omit. I have the same opinion of the numbers and characters which have been only too curiously quoted by