This Prince who unlawfully kept the conjurer from the Judge’s authority hardly lived two years longer, but died in the prime of his life; and after he had undertaken the defence of an evil cause nothing prospered in his government. From this it is clear that God never leaves unpunished those Princes who defend His enemies; for He has expressly commanded: “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live” (Exodus xxii, 18).
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Chapter III
Whether this Magic can produce True Effects
Argument
Any man who maintained that all the effects of magic were true, or who believed that they were all illusions, would be rather a radish than a man. Most often the devil, being the father of lies, deceives us and blinds our eyes or mocks our other senses with vain illusory images: and not seldom God prevents him from achieving on behalf of witches what he would and could truly essay; and when he sees that this is so he has recourse to glamours, so that his impotence may not be perceived. But when God permits it, and the devil wishes to produce a true effect, provided that it does not exceed his power, then there is nothing to prevent him from effecting a genuine result; for he then applies active to passive principles, and natural causes engender a true effect. Dionysius of Athens (De Diuinis Hominibus, IV.) proves this when he affirms that the Devil did not, in sinning, lose his natural gifts, so that he has the greatest natural strength together with age-long and unlimited experience to enable him to produce a true effect when he desired. But witches’ works are illusions, not real but apparent. This is shown by Glycas[1] where he speaks of the Egyptian Magicians who seemed to do as Moses did, and says: “They indeed changed their rods into serpents, but the rod of Moses swallowed their rods. And they also changed the water into blood, but once it had been changed, they could not restore it to its former state. They brought forth frogs also, but they were unable to protect the houses of the Egyptians from them. They had power to plague the Egyptians, but they had no power to ease their afflictions. Rather did God afflict the magicians with the same boils and blains as the rest of the people suffered; that it might be shown that not only were they unable to avert the divine punishment, but they must themselves partake of it.”
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Examples.
We read that the sorcerer Pasetes by means of certain enchantments caused a sumptuous feast to appear, and again he made all vanish at his pleasure. He used also to buy things and count out the price, and shortly the money would be found to have passed back secretly from the seller to the buyer. In S. Clement of Rome we also read much concerning Simon Magus: that he made a new man out of air, whom he could render invisible at will; that he could pierce stones as if they were clay; that he brought statues to life; that when cast into the fire he was not burned; that he had two faces like another Janus; that he could change himself into a ram or a goat; that he flew in the air; that he suddenly produced a great quantity of gold; that he could set up kings and cast them down; that he com-
- ↑ “Glycas.” Michael Glycas, Byzantine historian. His “Annals” commence with the Creation and conclude with the death of Alexis I, Commenus, 1118. Editions; Bekker, Bonn, 1836; Migne, Paris, 1866.
