World a Story so inconsistent with Religion Philosophy and Common Sense Is it not true what I say It is true said I that I would have been of the Opinion either to have said nothing at all or more of it Athanasius and St. Jerome replied he had no mind to speak more of it for they knew no more but that and though they had known all which could not be unless they were of our number they would not have rashly divulged the Secrets of Wisdom But why did not that Sylph said I propose to St. Anthony what you propose to day to me What said the Count laughing Matrimony Ha ha that had been to good purpose indeed It is true replied I that in all appearance the good Man would not have embraced the Match No certainly saiâ— the Count for it would have been a tempting of God to have married aâ— that Age and to have asked Children of him How replied I do you marry with Sylphs then to have Children by them For what end else said he are Men ever allowed to marry for another end I did not think replied I that ye expected or pretended to any Issue but that all ye did was onely to immortalize Sylphs Ha! You are in the wrong continued he the Charity of Philosophers makes them propose for their end the Immortality of the Sylphides but Nature mâ—kes them desirous to see them fruitful You shall see when you have a mind those Philosophical Families in the Air. Happy were the World if it had none but such Families and if there were no Children of Corruption in it What do you call Children of Corruption Sir said I interrupting him Such are said he my Son such are all the Children who are born in the ordinary way Children conceived by the Will of the Flesh not by the Will of God Children of Wrath and Malediction in a word Children of Men and Women You have a mind to interrupt me I know very well what you would say Verily my Son you must know that it was never the Will of the Lord that Men and Women should have Children by the way they procreate The Design of the all-wise Creator was much more Noble he intended the World should have been peopled far otherwise than it is if wretched Adam had not so grosly disobeyed the Command of God Not to touch Eve and if he had been satisfied with all the other Fruits of the Garden of Pleasure with the Beauty of the Nymphs and Sylphides the World would not have had the disgrace to be filled with Men so imperfect that they may pass for Monsters if compared with the Children of Philosophers How Sir said I by what I perceive you believe that the crime of Adam is somewhat else than the eating of the Apple What my Son replied the Count are you of the number of those that have the simplicity to understand the Story of the Apple literally Ha! You must know that the Holy Tongue uses those innocent Metaphors to keep us from conceiving Obscene Notions of an Action which occasioned all the Miseries of Mankind So when Solomon said I will ascend the Palm tree and gather the fruits thereof he had another appetite than the eating of Dates that Tongue which is consecrated by Angels and used by them in singing Hymns to the Living God hath no Terms to express what it figuratively names calling it an Apple or Date But a Sage easily explains those chaste Figures when he perceives that the Mouth or Taste of Eve are not punished and that she brings forth in pain He knows that it is not the Taste that was in the fault And discovering what was the first sin by the care which the first sinners had to cover some parts of their Bodies with Fig-tree Leaves he concludes that it was not the will of God that Men should multiply by that base way O Adam you should have begotten none but men like your self or none but Heroes and Giants Pray now what expedient was there said I interrupting him for one or other of those mervellous Generations To obey God replied he to touch none but Nymphs Gnomes Sylphides or Salamanders So none but Heroes would have sprung from his Loins and the Universe would have been peopled with a wonderful Race filled with strength and wisdom God was pleased to let us guess at the difference that would have been betwixt that innocent world and the sinful world which now we see by suffering now and then Children to be begotten after the manner that he has projected There has been sometimes then Sir said I some of those Children of the Elements And a Doctor of the Sorbonne who cited to me t'other day St. Austine St. Jerome and Gregory Nazianzene is mistaken then in believing that no fruit could spring from the loves of those spirits for our women or the commerce that men might have with certain Devils whom he called Hyphialtes Lactantius reasoned better replied the Count and solid Thomas Aquinas hath learnedly decided that those copulations might not onely be fruitful but that the Children so begotten are of a far more generous and heroick nature than others In effect you shall read when you please the high feats of those mighty and famous men who as Moses says were begotten in that manner we have amongst us the Histories of them in the Book of the Wars of the Lord cited in the Twenty third Chapter of Numbers However judge what a world it would be if all its Inhabitants for instance resembled Zoroaster Zoroaster said I who is reputed to be the Author of Necromancy The very same said the Count of whom the ignorant have wrote that calumny he had the honour to be the Son of the Salamander Oromasis and Vesta the Wife of Noah He lived Twelve hundred years the wisest Monarch in the world and then was by his Father Oromasis transported into the Region of Salamanders I make no doubt said I but Zoroaster is with the Salamander Oromasis in the Region of Fire but I would be loath to put such an affront upon Noah as you have done The affront is not so great as you may imagine replied the Count all those Patriarchs reckoned it a great honour to be the presumptive Fathers of the Children which the Sons of God were willing to beget upon their Wives but this is likewise a little too strong for you Let us return to Oromasis he was beloved of Vesta the Wife of Noah That same Vesta after her death was the Tutelary Genius of Rome and the Sacred Fire which she would have carefully kept by Virgins was to the honour of her Gallant the Salamander Besides Zoroaster they had also a Daughter of an excellent Beauty and extream Wisdom she was that Divine Egeria from whom Numa Pompilius received all his Laws She obliged Numa whom she loved to build a Temple to her Mother Vesta where the Sacred Fire was kept in honour of her Father Oromasis This is the truth
so great a stock of Satisfaction in any Man as appeared in all his Carriage he had a more sedate and composed mind than a Sorcerer I thought could have He had the aspect of a Man whose Conscience upbraided him with nothing that was foul and I was very impatient to hear him enter upon the matter not being able to conceive how a Man who in all things else appeared to me so judicious and accomplished could be deluded by the Visions with which I perceived him infâ—â—ted the day before He talked Divinely of Policy and was ravished to hear that I had read Plato on that Subject You 'll need all that one day said he more than now you are aware of and if we fadge to day it is not impossible but that in process of time you may have occasion to put in practice those Sageâ—-Maximes With that we entered into Ruel and went into the Garden but the Count disdaining to admire the Beauties of the place marched straight towards the Labyrinth Perceiving that we were in as solitary a place as he could desire I praise cried he lifting up his Eyes and Hands to Heaven I praiâ—e the Eternal Wisdom that he hath put it into my mind to conceal nothing from you of his ineffable Truth How happy will you be my Son if he have the goodness to endue your Soul with the Dispositions that so high Mysteries require You are now to learn how to command all Nature God alone shall be your Master and the Sages onely your Peers The supream Intelligences shall think it their honour to obey your desires the Devils shall not dare to appear where you are your voice shall make them tremble in the pottomless Pit and all the invisible People who inhabit the four Elements will reckon themselves happy to be the Ministers of your Pleasures I adore thee O great God! in that thou hast crowned Man with so much Glory and made him Monarch over all the Works of thine Hands Do you feel my Son said he turning to me do you feel that Heroick Ambition which is a sure Character of the Children of Wisdom Dare you desire to serve none but God alone and to bear rule over every thing which is not God Have you learnt yet what it is to be Man And is it not tedious to you to be a Slave seeing you are born to be Soveraign And if you entertain those noble thoughts as the Figure of your Nativity suffers me not to doubt Consider deliberately with your self if you have the Courage and Resolution to renounce all things that may be a hinderance to you in attaining to that pitch of Elevation for which you are born He stopt there and fixed his Eyes upon me as if he expected my Answer or endeavoured to read it in my heart How much the beginning of his Discourse made me hope that we should quickly come to the point so much did his last words make me despair of it The word Renounce starttled me and I made no doubt but that he was going to propose to me the renouncing of my Baptism or Paradise So not knowing which way to come off Renounce Sir said I how must I renounce any thing then Without doubt you must replied he and that is so absolutely necessary that it is the first thing you must do I cannot tell if you can resolve to do it But I know very well that Wisdom dwells not in a body subject to sin as it enters not into a Soul prepossessed with error or malice The Sages will never admit of you into their Society if you renounce not one thing which is inconsistent with wisdom You must added he very softly laying his Mouth to my Ear renounce all Carnal dealing with Women At that odd Proposition I burst forth in Laughter You have let me go upon very easie terms Sir said I I expected you should have proposed to me some strange Renunciation but since all your Quarrel is with Women the thing is done long ago I am chaste enough I thank God for it Nevertheless Sir since Solomon was a wiser Man than ever I shall be perhaps and that all his Wisdom could not hinder him from being corrupted Tell me if you please what Expedient do ye Gentlemen of the Cabal take to forgo that Sex and what inconvenience would it be if in the Paradise of Philosophers every Adam should have his Eve You ask great Matters replied he consulting with himself if he should Answer my Question Nevertheless since I perceive that you will without difficulty renounce Women I will tell you one of the Reasons which hath obliged the Sages to exact this condition from their Disciples and by that you 'll know in what Ignorance live all those who are not of our number When you shall be listed among the Children of the Philosophers and your Eyes fortified by the use of the most Sacred Medicine you 'll at first discover that the Elements are inhabited by most perfect Creatures whom the sin of wretched Adam hath deprived his too wretched Posterity of the Knowledge of This immense space which is betwixt the Earth and the Heavens has far more noble Inhabitants than Birds and Gnats those vast Seas have many other Guests besides Whales and Dolphins the depth of the Earth is not made onely for Moles and the more noble Element of Fire was not created to remain void and useless The Air is full of an innumerable multitude of People of Humane Shape in appearance somewhat fierce but in reality tractable great lovers of Sciences Subtle Officious to the Sages and the Enemies of the Foolish and Ignorant Their Wives and Daughters are Masculine Beauties such as they paint the Amazones How Sir cried I would you make me believe that those Goblins are married Startle not my Son at so small a matter replied he believe that what I tell you is a solid truth these are but the Elements of the Ancient Cabal and it shall be no Mans fault but your own if your own Eyes convince you not but receive with a docile mind the Knowledge which God sends to you by my Ministery Forget all that you may have learnt of those things in the Schools of the Ignorant for it will vex you when you are convinced by experience to be forced to confess that you have been wilful out of purpose Hear me out then and know that the Seas and Rivers are inhabited as well as the Air the Ancâ—ent Sages named that kind of People Vndians or Nymphs They begat few Males and Women abound amongst them they are exceedingly Beautiful and the Daughters of Men are not to be compared to them The Earth is filled almost to the Center with Gnomes a People of a low Stature the Guardians of Treasures Mines and precious Stones They are Ingenious Friends to Man and easie to be commanded They supply the Children of the Sages with what Money they need and desire no other Wages for their Service but the
you are a Vessel of Election Heaven has destin'd you for the greatest Cabalist of your Age. Here is the Figure of your Nativity that cannot fail if it happen not presently and by my means it will be when your Retrograde Saturn shall think fit Nay God Sir If it be my luck to become a Sage said I no Man I assure you shall ever have a hand in it except the great Gabalis but to speak freely I am somewhat afraid you 'll find it no easie task to perswade me to this Philosophick Gallantry Is it then because you are so bad a Naturalist replied he as not to believe the Existence of these People I cannot tell said I but I am still of opinion that they are but Goblins in disguise Will you still give greater credit to your Nurse answered he than to Natural Reason than to Plato Pythagoras Celsus Psellus Proclus Porphyrius Jamblichus Plotinus Trismegistus Noll us Dorneus Fluddus than to the great Philippus Aurelius Theophrastus Bombastus Paracelsus of Honeinhem and all the rest of our Companions I 'll believe you Sir said I as much and more than all these Blades But dear Sir cannot you so order matters with your Brethren that I be not obliged to melt away in love with these Elementary Lasses Alas replied he you are at your liberty no Man is forced to love but though few of the Sages are proof against their Charms yet there have been some who reserving themselves wholly to greater Matters as you shall know hereafter have denied that honour to Nymphs I 'll be one of those then answered I for indeed I cannot bring my self to a resolution to lose time in using of the Ceremonies which as I have heard a Prelat say are necessary for obtaining the Commerce of those Spirits That Prelat knew not what he said replied the Count for you shall one day see that they are not Spirits and besides never did a Sage use either Ceremonies or Superstition for gaining the Familiarity of Spirits nor of the People of whom we speak A Câ—balist never acts but by Natural Principles and if in our Books there be sometimes hard Words Characters and Fumigations to be found that is onely to hide from the ignorant the Principles of Nature Admire the simplicity of Nature in all her most wonderful Operations and in that simplicity so great so exact and necessary an Harmony that in spight of your Prejudices it will cure you of your weak Apprehensions What I am about to tell you we teach those of our Disciples whom we suffer not to enter into the innermost Sanctuary of Nature and yet will not deprive of the Society of the Elementary People out of compassion that we have for the same People The Salamanders as you perhaps already conceive are composed of the most subtle parts of the Sphere of Fire conglobated and organised by the influence of the universal Fire of which some time or other I will discourse to you so called because it is the principle of all the Motions of Nature In the same manner the Sylphs are composed of the purest atomes of Air the Nymphs of the thinnest particles of Water and the Gnomes of the subtilest parts of the Earth Adam bore some proportion with these so perfect Creatures because being made up of the purest part of the four Elements he contained in himself the perfections of these four kinds of People and was their Natural King But when sin had precipitated him among the Excrements of the Elements as you shall see some other time the Harmony was untuned and becoming gross and impure he bore no more proportion with those so pure and subtile Substancâ—s What remedy to this evil How is the Lute to be tuned again and this lost Soveraignty retrived O Nature Why art thou so little studied Do not you conceive my Son with what simplicity Nature can restore Man to the Blessings which he hath lost Alas Sir replied I I am very ignorant in all these simplicities But it is very easie however to be knowing in them answered he If we would recover the Empire over the Salamanders we must purifie and exalt the Element of Fire that is in us and raise again the tone of that slackened String There is no more to be done but to concentrate the Fire of the World by concave mirrours in a Bowl of Glass and this is the Operation which all the Ancients have religiously concealed until Divine Theophrastus revealed it In that Bowl there is a Solary Powder made which being of it self purified from the mixture of other Elements and being prepared according to Art becomes in a very short time a Sovereign Remedy to exalt the Fire that is in us and to â—â—ke us if one may say so become of an igneous Nature Then do the Inhabitants of the Sphere of Fire become our inferiors and ravished to see our mutual Harmony restored and that we are become like to them they have the same love and friendship for us that they have for their own kind all the respect which they owe to the Image and Vicegerent of their Creator and all the care that the desire of obtaining the immortaâ—ity which they want by our means can make them excogitate The truth is as being more subtile and pure than those of the other Elements they live very long so they are not so solicitous in demanding Immortality from the Sages You may make use of one of those my Son if the aversion you talk of last always probably you shall never hear her speak one word of that which you are so much afraid of The ease is not the same with the Sylphs Gnomes and Nymphs for seeing as being shorter lived they stand more in need of us so their Familiarity is more easily obtained There is no more to be done for 〈◊〉 but to stop a bottle full of congâ—obated Air Water or Earth and set it for a month in the Sun and then to separate the Elements according to Art which above all is most easie to be done in the Water and Earth It is wonder what a strange Load-stone each of these Elements purified are to attract Nymphs Sylphes and Gnomes As little almost as nothing taken of it daily for the space of some months will let you see in the Air the republick volant of Sylphs the Nymphs coming in crouds to the Shore and the Guardians of Treasure opening Shop and laying out their Wealth So that without Characters Ceremonies and barbarous Words one becomes absolute over all those People They demand no Worship from a Sage whom they know to be nobler than themselves Thus venerable Nature teaches her Children to repair the Elements by the Elements Thus is Harmony restored Thus does Man recover his Natural Empire and can do all things in the Elements without the Devil or black Art You see now my Son that the Sages are more inâ—â—cent than you imagine What do you say I admire you Sir said I