of Light. Spin. de Strigib. c. 15. Anon. tract. 3. de credul. Dæm. adhib. Thyr. de loc. infest. part 2. c. 26 num. 4. Dan. au 4. point. Richer au disc. des images. cap. 10. num. 1.
Plutarch, Brut.
Valer. Max. I. 55.When he tried to tempt Jesus Christ and carried Him to the pinnacle of the Temple and to the top of a high mountain, he had the appearance of a man. When he addressed himself to Françoise Secretain, Jacques Bocquet, Clauda Jamprost, and several others of whom we shall speak later, it was under the shape of a man that he gained them. Of the same form was the demon which appeared to Brutus when he was about to pass out of Asia, and that which appeared to Cassius after the defeat of Mark Antony’s army, which openly said that he was a devil. The devils which came out of the Idol of the Moon, which St. Jude broke in pieces, had the appearance of Ethiopians. Cynops, who cast himself into the sea at the prayers of St. John the Evangelist, was accompanied by three devils in the form of men newly raised from the dead. Satyrs, Fauns and Sylvans are nothing but devils bearing some resemblance to men.
Sometimes the Evil One takes the form of a woman, as we are taught in the stories of the lives of St. Anthony and St. Jerome, among others: Plutarch, Dion.
Plin. epist. 27. lib. 7.and the two demons which appeared to Dion were in the form of women, as also seems to have been that which Curtius Rufus saw as he was walking late one day along a gallery. Hector Boece. lib. 8.In Boethius also we have the story of a very beautiful young man who was burdened with a Succubus devil with a very fair face. What we know of Succubi is proof enough that the Devil often assumes the form of a woman, and that he chiefly does so at the Sabbat, as is evidenced by the words of Thievenne, of Jacquema Paget, and of several other witches.
