the Star that appear'd in Bethleem the Letters sent to him from divers Kings to the adoration of the Magi the discourses he held when very young in the Temple of Aesculapius to the disputation of Christ among the Doctours the questions put to him by his Disciples to those of the Apostles the judgement he passed upon the Eunuch and the Concubine to that on the woman taken in adultery the apparition he met with upon Mount Caucasus to the temptation of the Devil in the wildernesse the incredulity of the Ephesians to that of the Jews his deliverance of a young man possessed with the Devil to the like action of Christ the Maid he raised to life at Rome to Jairus's daughter his appearing to Damis and Demetrius without the City to that of our Saviour to the two Disciples going to Emmaus the words he said to them to those of Jesus Christ Spiritus carnem ossa non habet and lastly his death and ascension either to that of Christ or to the translation of Enoch or Eliah All these parallels I have the rather thought fit to particularize to shew the malice and the pitifull and indiscreet subtlety of Philostratus and consequently that the safest way to refute all these fictions is to deny them any relation to Magick contrary to what Franciscus Picus hath done because Jews and Gentiles might make their advantage of them aud thence draw an example to prove what they have so often said of Christ in the Gospel Now we know thou hast a Devil for thou castest out Devils through Beelzebub the prince of Devils Besides that we must with Eusebius absolutely deny them and so proceed according to his directions in the discovery of them that we may lay open the weak grounds they are built upon and all the imperinencies and contradictions they are guilty of Ut vetusta habeantur ista non ut in vincula virorum sint sed oblectamenta puerorum CHAP. XIII Of the Genii attributed to Socrates Aristotle Plotinus Porphyrius Jamblicus Chicus Scaliger and Cardan THe Jesuit Thyraeas quotes an observation of some people sufficiently superstitious who say that all Children borne in the Ember-weeks commonly bring along with them their caules or certaine membranes and are much more likely then others to gaine the acquaintance and familiarity of the Genii designed for their conduct The same Priviledge they also pretend to according to Ptolemy who have the Moon in conjunction with Sagittary Lady of their actions or with Pisces of the Nativity All we inferre hence is to imagine one of these two happened in the Nativities of all those for whom we make this Chapter since that by the Anthority of most Authors every one of them might presume he was brought into the Temple of Glory and Immortality by the extraordinary assistance of some Genius or familiar Daemon which was to them as Apuleius sayes singularis praefectus domesticus speculator individuus arbiter inseparabilis testis malorum improbator â—onorum probator But since this opinion cannot be asserted without much injury done to these great men and taking away from the obligation we owe their excellent Labours by the meanes whereof and not by that of these Daemons and tutelary Gods so many precious reliques and monuments of their Learning have come to our knowledge me thinks it is but just we should continue them in their deserv'd reputation and shew the true meaning may be given this Conversation and correspondence how extravagant their imaginations are who believe it to have been such as that of the Angels with holy men or that of Devills with Magicians For to come as near the truth as may be we are to observe that the Platonicks as Jamblichus and Foxius affirme assigned four kinds of rationall Creatures after that which they called the first Being or first Goodnesse that is the first Author and Mover of all things that is to say the Celestiall Gods or Angels the Daemons inferior to them the Heroes and the souls of all men The principall duty and employment of the Daemons being as Proclus affirmes only to enterpose and manage the affaires and conduct of the last and to be as it were their guides and interpreters towards the Gods some have taken occasion from the resemblance of these actions with those of the souls over their bodies to call them sometimes by the name of Daemons And to do this they thought there was much more reason when they arriv'd to such a defiance of the Slavery and tyranny of the matter wherein they were as it were immers'd that they had the absolute disposall of all their faculties and were as miraculous in all they did as those Daemons were thought According to this sense that does Apuleius say Animus humanus etiam nunc in corpore situs Daemon nuncupatur and Heraclitus that the Spirit of a man was to him instead of a Genius 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 besides that it may easily be inferr'd from these two verses of Virgil. Diine nunc ardorem mentibus addunt Eurgale an sua cuique deus fit dira cupido that the just desires and good operations of the soul may in like manner be qualifi'd with the name of God Adde to this what Porphyrius sayes after Plato in his Timaeus that God hath assign'd the superior faculty of our Mind as a Daemon to conduct us and that it may be justly called Eudaemon who looks on Wisdom as the Pharos that should direct it in all the actions of his life This might well serve for a generall solution to that whatever may be said of the familiarity and acquaintance of Socrates Aristotle and others with certain Devils were it not also requisite to answer the objections may be made against them in particular To begin then with that famous and so well known Daemon of Socrates no lesse celebrated by their Authority from whom we have the history of it than by the great diversity of opinions concerning it Some affirm it might truely be some Apparition others that it was a pure fiction of that Philosopher or of his two Disciples Xenophon and Plato who as falsely advanc'd the report of this divine assistance as that of the Oracle's declaring him the wisest of Mankind as if there were any reason to bestow the highest and proudest Title imaginable on a lewd fellow that publikely prosess'd Ignorance Sloath and Sodomy who liv'd upon almes knowing not any art or discipline and endeavouring to discredit all the Sciences by his ignorant Wisdome Socraticique gregis fuit haec Sapientia quondam Scire nihil a man that breath'd nothing but the introduction of Atheisme deservedly reprov'd and laugh'd at by Aristophunes Timon Aristotle and Athenaeus And lastly a man that for all the praises have been given him is only oblig'd to two of his disciples persons not free from suspition and consequently not absolutely creditable who might as well write Apologies
Minerva that is the conversation of learned and prudent men For indeed it were more rationall to acknowledge with Arnobius Quae nequeunt sciri nescire nos confitemur neque ea conquirere aut investigare curamus quae comprehendi liquidissimum est non posse quamvis mille per corda suspicio se rigat atque intendat humana than to waste our spirits in the pretended mysteries of the Cabala the superstitious invocations of Magick the fruitlesse study of the Philosophers stone and the fantasticall predictions of certain Figure-flingers and Cunning-women since they are extravagancies that find no entertainment but in the imaginations of vulgar and reptile souls easily taken in such cobwebs as a mind any thing masculine cannot be ensnar'd in without an absolute losse of reputation and prudence For two reasons have I brought in Savanorola and Merlin into the number of the great persons for whom I make this Apologie one is that they were the Prophets of their Countries as they say Nostradamus was of France Lolhardus of Germany and Telesphorus and the Abbot Joachim of Calabria The other that it is a kind of justice to make a true discovery of them so to raise them from under those heaps of calumnies which cover both them and what we should know of them As to the famous Merlin all Authours hitherto have thought him gotten by an Incubus who was a little too familiar with a certain Kings daughter then a Nun in a Monastery at Carmarthen What credit can be expected for all the other stories of his life when we must be lesse prudent and more credulous than Godfrey of Monmouth from whom we have them to beleeve such a nativity as this any way possible Whence we may safely infer that the foundation of such a prodigious relation being so ill laid it must needs be absolutely false and forg'd as we shall without any difficulty demonstrate For if our Daemonographers will not admit the generation of Merlin to have been by the ordinary way they must needs acknowledge that whatever is said of him is nothing but pure fiction and consequently the surest and safest way to answer them is to deny what they say as confidently as they affirm it I shall not therefore at the present make it any question whether there are such Daemons as the Incubi and Succubae but onely with Wierus Sibilla Cardan Casmannus Ulric Molitor Guibelet Eugubinus Nicholas Remy Maldonat and divers others deny that their copulations with mankind can produce any generation whether they do it by eluding the imagination or make use of humane bodies Not because as Nicholas Remy would have it man and the Devil differ in specie for a Mule is engendered between a Horse and an Asse nor yet because God will not co-operate with such an action by the infusion of a soul for Adulterers Fornicators and incestuous persons should never ingender for the same reason but for that if they ingender it is necessary it should be of their own seed or a borrow'd To think they have any of their own were too palpable an absurdity since that as they are immateriall substances they cannot possibly have that excrement and as it were quintessence extracted out of abundance of nourishment and consisting of blood and spirits Besides that if this were granted their productions would be like themselves or rather some mediate substance between a man and a Daemon than an absolute man Burdonem ut sonipes generat commixtus asellae Mulus ut Arcadicis ab equina matre creatur Tityrus ex ovibus oritur hircoque parente Musinonem capra ex vervegno semine gignit Apris atque sue setosus nascitur ibris Ut lupus catula formant coeundo liciscam On the other side to attribute to the Daemons a power to transport the seed from one place to another without diminishing the generative vertue and the principle which it contains is a tenent hath no reason at all to support it when even those that have the instrument of generation of an over-great length are not so able for the act because the conduit being so long the seed cools and the principle is weakened And that it must be much more thus in the seed of the Incubi is not to be question'd since that Witches cottidianae istae as they are called in Lipsius genialiam libidinum victimae infelices mulierculae do all unanimously confesse in their depositions that they find it extreamly cold and receive it without either pleasure or satisfaction as having not those spirits without which there cannot be any nor indeed generation be effected Further as Gold being the most perfect of Metals is accordingly of the most difficult production so must it be thought that man the noblest of all Creatures hath by the same reason a more difficult a more perfect and a more accomplish'd generation than any other Adde to this that the most considerable authority which may be brought against this negative out of Genes 6. is no more advantageous to our Adversaries than the great number of experiences they endeavour to collect from Apollonius Alexander Romulus Servius Tullius Simon Magus Geffrey Great-tooth Balderus Luther the Huns and Counts of Cleveland or the Corocoton of new Spain and the Nefesoglians of the Turks For that passage of Genesis where it is said After the sons of God went in to the daughters of men c. is to be understood according to Eugubinus and Maldonat of the sons of Seth who was a holy man and esteem'd by God and the daughters of Cham the most corrupt man of his age Or as some interpret it by the Sons of God are meant Judges whom the Scripture often cals by the name of Elohim And lastly for the said experiences no doubt but they are fabulous and the meer fictions of such as thought to make those persons more recommendable by such Romances which indeed while the world was yet in swadling clouts were good to cover and conceal Adulteries and to preserve the reputation of those Ladies who were more than ordinarily desirous of their pleasure But now that the world 's grown up to yeers of discretion and more than ever refin'd Mart. Et pueri nasum Rhinocerotis habent such inventions are thought as vain and triviall as all the stories of the Magicall Romances of Maugis d' Aigremont Dr. Faustus or our Merlin Of this latter all I think may be truly and rationally said is that he was not the son of one of these Incubi and that according to the description we have of him from Lelandus and Balaeus he was the most excellent Philosopher and Mathematician of his time Disciple to Telesinus and a great Favourite to four Kings of England viz. Vortigern Ambrose Utherpendragon and Arthur whom all Romancists make the first Institutor of the Knights of the Round Table with whom agrees the Poet Annevillanus Arthurus teretis mensae
excellently learned and well vers'din the Alcoran undertook without any other assistance than that of an Astrologer that seconded him with his predictions and the great opinion men had of his life to crowne King of Africk the Son of a Potter a poor and necessitous man called Abdelmon To effect which with more ease he first got some followers by the introduction of a new Heresy and then perceiving himself sufficiently seconded so far as to engage in the publick Affairs and to reforme them at his pleasure he began to propose that Abdelmon was a person raiâ—'d up by God who through his meanes would plant the holy Alphurcanistick Law through all the world His next businesse was to preach down the race of the Almoravides calling them Tyrants and Usurpers as such as had driven out the family of the Alabeci and the blood of their Prophet Mahomet This done he set upon the person of the Caliph of Baldac high Prist of their Law and did so well by the force of his perswasions that having gottten this Abdelmon the assistance of the greatest part of the Nobility there happened a great battle between them wherein the King Albohaly Aben Tessin being kill'd in the year 1147. this Noble Potter Abdelmon was made King and Miramomelin of Africk From this story I leave men to judge whether Savonarala might not governe at Florence quando as Paulus Jovius speaking of him well observes nihil validius esset ad persuadendum specâ—e ipsa pietatis in qua etiam tuendae Libertatis studium emineret I should have left Michael Nostradamus out of this Apology were it not to adde some lustre to so many excellent persons by the temerarious ignorance and little merit of this upstart prophet as the sparkling of a Diamond is heightned by a little foile Or rather to imitate that great Julius Caesar Scaliger who having pass'd his judgment on the most famous Poets would needs give the same upon Rhodophilus and Dolet alledging by way of excuse that it was in imitation of Aristotle who in the same Book treats of living Creatures and their ordure and excrements This may I much more apply to this Monster of abuses whose liâ—e I shall not set forth according to its principall circumstances since they are so flat and pittifull that no Historian hath yet medled with them but the Author of the French Janus and the Pleiades it being my businesse only to observe the vanity of his Designes For not content to have cheated us in his praedictions which he printed at the beginning of every year from 1550. till 1567. he further imâ—gin'd that he might easily blast the memory of Merlin Telesphorus Cataldus Lolhardus Joachim Savonarola Laurentio Miniati Antonio Torquatö and all those that had dabled in predictions by the reputation he was in hope to gaine by publishing a Decad of Centuries upon the future state of all things in the world These were no sooner abroad but they immediately got him a quite contrary repute some as Roâ—sard and Monluc not knowing what to say to their falling out true sometimes and others looking on them as lyes fooleries and impostures and containing such a diversity of crafty ambiguities that it were in a manner impossible not to find something among so many thousands of tetrasticks upon any occasion a man can propose to himself Accordingly did some take thence occasion to make sport with those falsities among whom the most ingenious was he who without charging him with contradictions or calling him Monstre d' abus and Monstra-damus as divers did onely sent him this Distick Nostra damus cum verba damus nam fallere nostrum est Et cum verba damus nil nisi nostra damus But as there is no Cause so desperate which in time meets not with some that will patronise it so much it be acknowledg'd that there are a many hollow braines and minds fit only to receive any thing that is extravagant and that without any examination who think their pockets empty without these Centuries which they idolise as Humanists do Petronius and Politicians Tacitus looking on them as more infallible then the Gospell and making it appear on all occasions that happen daily though ever so triviall Virg. geor 4. Novit namque omnia vates Quae sint fuerint quae mox venturâ— trahantur Yet does not this Idolatry hinder but that among those who admire them so much it is a controversy by what meanes the Authour could arrive to such a certain knowledge of things to come Some hold he got it by the practise of judiciall Astrology others that it was reveal'd to him by the meanes of some familiar Daemon and a third sort that he had no other assistance then that of the capacity of the humane Soul to foretell things to come For according to the opinion of Avicenna when she is disengag'd from the government of the body she suffers a certain paralysis and leaves it as it were buried in the masse of its terrestriall Element that so she may be free to consider what is at the greatest distance from her Then it is that shee sees things to come as present which she could not have done while the exigencies of the body divert her from this contemplation And this happens for the most part when being forc'd against her naturall motion by the violent agitation of Melancholly she displayes and discovers what is most hidden in her that is her divine and celestiall forces and faculties so that there is nothing hinders her from exceeding her ordinary Limits and arriving to the knowledge of things to come Of this we have some experience in old men who being in the utmost declination of their age do often foretell what afterwards comes to passe as if the soul by a certain anticipation were already at Liberty To strengthen this last opinion they adde that were some reason to charge Nature with a certaine discare of mankind if she deny'd this perfection to man when we see the birds call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Messengers of the Gods as Euripides terms them and severall other Creatures foretel by the disposition of the Aire the changes of seasons wind raine fair weather tempests and all this without any other instruction than that of their naturall instinct I have been more particular in this last cause then in the other two because Nostradamus himself confesses in his Epistle to the three Centuries dedicated to Henry the second of France that he uttered his predictions rather through a naturall instinct attended by a Poeticall fury then by any assistance of the rules of Poesy though he had reconcil'd them to astronomicall Calculations But since the truth reputation of that so Mysterious book cannot subsist but by one of these three reasons they certainly are to be blam'd for their over-credulity who would ground the Authority of this Fortune-teller upon causes which if they had well examined them they
may answer to the first that there is not any one can assure us that this laughing of Zoroastes happened precisely on the day of his nativity whether when he was asleep or awake whether by the percussion of the Aire or only an agitation of his lips all which one should know to judge aright of it But to take away the prodigy strangenesse of this accident Hippocrates tells us that Children assoon as they are born seeme to laugh or cry as they sleep and that waking there is a constant vicissitude of laughing and crying till they have passed forty dayes This might have happened more particularly to Zoroastes through abundance of Spirits and consequently heat which rescuing him from that humidity that is common to others caus'd that action in him which might well signifie that he should one day prove a very great man but not a Magician It is indeed a Circumstance hath ever been thought very fortunate so that it gave Virgil occasion to say Cui non risere parentes Nec deus hunc mensa Dea nec dignata cubili est For those who laugh so soon are ordinarily more active and lively or as Hippocrates calls them 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that is such as have a certaine nimblenesse and vivacity of spirit and accordingly give greater hopes of their future good fortune then those who are stupi'd slow and whose spirits are dull and heavy Nor shall we need if we may trust Pliny trouble our selves â—o derive any greater presage from the motion of his Braine it being ordinary in all Children newly born to have a certain cavity about the brain-pan where the sagittall future meets with the coronall which is cover'd with a grosse and thick membrane about which at least till it be converted into bone a man may easily perceive visu tactu as the most Learned Anatomist Riolanus hath observed in his Osteologie the constant beating of the brain which haply was preceiv'd more strong and vehement in Zoroastes then it is usually in other Children by reason of the abundance of Spirits and naturall heat which we have shewn to have been particular in him Lastly if any one will inferre that Zoroastes was a Magician because Pliny tells us that he remain'd 20. years in the Wildernesse and that Suidas and Volaterranus affirme that he dy'd struck with a Thunderbolt he must also with the same breath conclude that Epimenedes who stay'd therein 50. years that Moses who spent the third part of his age in it and that all the Fathers of Thebais were far greater Magicians then he since they bestow'd all their life time there And that Tullus Hostilius Pompeius Strabo Aurelius Carus Anastasius and Simeon Stilites were great Sorcerers and enchanters because they all dy'd thunderstuck And yet this is not a little in jurious to the truth of the History and to what is expresly observ'd of the last in the Spirituall Meadow of Sophronius where it is said that the Abbot Julian Stilites incensing at an unseasonable hour answer'd those who ask'd him the reason of it quia modo frater meus Simeon à fulgure dejectus interiit ecce transit anima ejus in tripudio exultatione Whence may be easily observ'd their want of judgment who upon the dis-security of such vain conjectures would perswade us that Zoroastes was the first inventer of Magick and the greatest enchanter of his time Which confidence I have the rather taken the trouble to refute to make way for that light of truth which we are to follow in the account we have of him and with the same breath blow away the proofs and grounds of certain Authors who believe that all the Learning the ancient Philosophers acquir'd in Aegypt was no other then that of the Magick and Invocations of this excellent person CHAP. IX That Orpheus was no Magician HUmane nature is so limited and confin'd that it cannot judge of things spirituall but by the sensible and materiall nor of substances but by their Accidents nor indeed of any thing it knows but by appearances The only way then me thinks to disengage Truth out of all these maskes and disguises is to take as strict and near a view of them as may be and when we come to the weight and tryall of them never to admit that prejudicate opinion which often obliges us to choose and preferre shadows before bodies darknesse before Light and the most extra-regular fables before certain and authentick Histories This we are to do with so much the more diligence and circumspection in this Chapter by how much that there is not any thing as Plutarch affirmes slides more insensibly into our soules or hath so much charme and force to attract and insinuate as the disposition of certain tales handsomely couch'd and interwoven such as for instance those of the miraculous Musick of Orpheus at which we see that Mirantur justique senes trepidaeque puellae Narrantis conjux pendet ab ore viri To proceed then to a strict and dispassionate examination of all the grounds which men have had to suspect this Great man and first Professor of divinity guilty of magick we must build upon the foundations layd in the former Chapter and say with Patricius that according to the testimony of Philo Josephus and all the best Authors the Sciences and disciplines which had been lost by the Flood having been re-establish'd in the Schooles of Sem and Heber the first erected as the Rabbins and Thalmudists affirme Zoroastes who had been instructed in them and who might be one of the Sons or Nephews of Cham endeavour'd so much to dilate and make them flourish in his Country of Chaldaea and among those of this Nation that besides the knowledge which Apuleius allows him of Medicine and that of Astrology attributed to him by St. Hierome Origen Properâ—ius Cicero Philelphus and most Writers and upon the account whereof they pass'd anciently for Astrologers as the Canaanites for Merchants and the Arabians for Robbers we have the Authority of Averroes cited by Patricius who sayes that Philosophy was sometime in as much esteem in Chaldaea as it was in his time in Spaine by the meanes of the University of Corduba All these Disciplines were afterwards translated into Aegypt when Abraham as is observ'd in the Scripture went down into Aegypt to sojourne there because the famine was sore in the Land For Josephus sayes plainely and Plato seems to agree with him that during his abode in that Country he taught the Aegytian Priests the Mathematicks and gave them as it were the first rudiments of all the other Sciences which thereupon so thriv'd and were so much improv'd that it became the spring-head whence the Greeks by long draughts got all their wisdom and Learning by the travells and pilgrimages of Orpheus Thales Democritus and Pythagoras whereof the first brought thence Theology the second the Mathematicks the
perswade us to things utterly impossible But since it were vainly to squander time away to lop off the branches in stead of pulling up the roots we must with that begin the ruine of all these fabulous narrations and shew that whatever the Platonicks have advanc'd either of Daemons or Magick can neither be prov'd by reason nor experience For first as to what they say that Nature cannot afford two Extreams without some Medium cementing and uniting them and that Heaven and Earth are two Extreams which can have no other Medium than these intellectuall powers The Peripateticks answer that they neither assigne the Medium nor the Extreams right for they should have oppos'd the first Mover which is absolutely immutable impassible and immoveable to things sublunary and afterwards joyn them together by the celestiall Nature which is naturally invariable and eternall and yet potentially subject to mutation resembling God in its intelligences and things transitory in its motion We may as easily answer what they say that the soul of the World being diffus'd and dispers'd thorow the whole Universe is not idle but produces Animals in all its parts and that those generated in Fire and Air are properly these called Daemons For besides that this universall Soul is formally denied by Mersennus in his book against Deists Aristotle never held that an Animal that must use severall Organs can be produc'd and conserv'd in the purity of those two Elements And for their last reason deriv'd from those many effects which must necessarily be attributed to those causes I would before I am forc'd to allow it for good they had satisfi'd as they ought Pompanatius Cardan and the learned Bishop Bernard Mirandulanus who pertinently shew that to beleeve Angels and Daemons it were better to refer to the assurances of our Religion than to all those experiences whereof a reason might be given out of the principles of naturall Philosophy This granted no question but all that may be said of the Genii attributed to Porphyrius Plotinus and Iamblicus may be referr'd to what we have already said of the Daemon of Socrates and that the other stories and miracles related of them are either meerly the flatteries of their Disciples and Followers or the pure inventions of Eunapius purposely advanc'd by him to lessen the esteem which men had of the sanctity of the new Christians And that the case stood thus with these three Philosophers it may be judg'd by that Treatise of Plotinus De proprio Daemone that what he sayes of it was rather out of conjecture than experience Nor could Porphyrius give better security for the little credit he gave all those superstitious practices than the Epistle read of him in Theodoret and Eusebius For he layes down therein eight or nine difficulties he made touching the invocations of Devils and their Sacrifices the least whereof were enough to convince us that he was no Magician All the trouble then fals upon Iamblicus because he was the man answer'd all those difficulties and doubts which hath given Authours occasion to tell more miracles of him than the two former But the best on 't is that it is yet with lesse ground and reason for as to Alectromancie by which Zonaras and most of the Daemonographers affirm that he endeavour'd to find out the name of him that should succeed the Emperour Valâ—ns Ammianus Marcellinus who liv'd in the same time delivers him from that calumny not making the least mention of him in the particular account he hath given us of that story And for his Ecstasies evocations and other miracles a man needs not take the pains to refute them because they sufficiently destroy themselves both by the absurdity that attends them and that fear Eunapius was in to be thought an Impostour for his relations This were enough to satisfie us that these Philosophers were not Magicians and that if there remain any difficulty concerning their Books which might any way prejudice their innocence as such as may be fraught with abundance of superstitious things we refer them to the sixth Chapter of this Apologie unlesse we should rather follow the opinion of Cardan who speaking of these Daemons sayes very judiciously Nolim ego ad trutinam haec sectari velut Porphyrius Psellus Plotinus Proclus Iamblicus qui copiosè de his quae non videre velut historiam scripserunt The same motive which made me speak of these ancient Philosophers obliges me to say somthing of three modern who are charg'd with an acquaintance and conversation with their Genii that is Chicus Aesculanus Scaliger and Cardan whereof what I shall deliver of the first tends rather to the vindication of Truth than the merit of his person or the advantage may be reaped from his Works For the onely Commentary we have of his upon the Sphear of Sacrobosco sufficiently discovers that he was not onely very superstitious as Delrio cals him but also that he had a soft place in his head there being three things in it that very much lay open his weaknesse The first is his interpretation of Sacrobosco's book according to the sense of Astrologers Necromancers and Chiroscopists The second his citations of abundance of falsifi'd Authours fraught with old wives tales and fooleries such as for instance that of Salomon De umbris idaearum Hipparchus De vinculo spiritûs De ministerio naturae De Hierarchiis Spirituum Apollonius De arte magicâ Zoroastes De Dominio quartarum octavae Spherae Hippocrates De stellarum aspectibus secundum Lunam Astafon De Mineralibus constellatis and divers others of the same metall The third that he often makes use of the Revelations of a Spirit called Floron which he said was of the Order of the Cherubims and being once ask'd what the spots in the Moon were he roundly answered Ut terra terra est But besides that he does not attribute this spirit to himself in any place of the said Commentary it may be easily judged that this relation is like what Pliny sayes of the Grammarian Appion who invocated the Devil to know what Countrey-man Homer was Or to that related by Bodin of Hermolaus Barbarus who did the same to know what Aristotle meant by the word Entelechia Or lastly to what Niphus sayes of one in his time who saw the way to make the Philosophers stone written in a piece of paper that was shewn him by a bearded Devil For all which extravaganeies what better solution can there be than that of Lucretius Quis dubitat quin omne sit hoc rationis egest as Were I at liberty to follow my inclination rather than my duty I should be loth to say any thing against the Genii attributed to the two only men whom we may oppose to the most learned and eminent of the Ancients as being the last production and miracle of Nature Scaliger and Cardan For I am clearly of opinion that either
should have found more false than any of his Centuries And this it were the more easy to shew in that of all predictions and Prophecyes that ever came to our knowledge we have not met with any more particular then those of Nostradamus who precisely markes out all the accidents and severall Circumstances even to occurrences of litle or no concernment Whence in the first place I inferre that he could not compose those predictions by the assistance of Astrology the Authors whereof having not left us any rules whereby we might attain the knowledge of those particulars For these are no more under the juridiction of that Art by reason of the uncertain emergencies of their causes then things purely free and contingent such as are the actions that depend meerly on our will and which in regard they have not any determinate truth or falshood cannot be either known or foreseen by the help of any humane science till such time as they are present In the second place I inferre that he could not have done it by any revelation from Daemons because even they consider'd in their nature have not any knowledge of these actions which are free depend purely on our will as being not able to foresee them either in their causes or their effects Not in the former because they are uncertaine while they remaine buried in the several motions of our mind as being such as St. Paul speaks of to the Corinthians None knows the things of man but the spirit of man that is in him not in the latter as being such as cannot be known till they appear So that if we allow his prophecies any foundation it must be that of the third cause grounded on the naturall capacity men sometimes have to foretell things to come which yet is pertinently refuted by Cicero and the learned Valesius who digg up the very corner stones of this erroneous opinion To answer therefore in few words all those reasons alledged to confirme it we are indeed to acknowledge that Melancholy may by reason of its qualities make men more desirous and capable of Sciences more earnest in the disquisition of causes and more perseverant in the deepest contemplations upon any subject nay that it may cause certain motions in the soul whereby it makes sooner discoveries of the reason it would find out But we must deny that there can proceed from it this naturall Divination whereof there is not in it either the cause principles or beginnings Nor is it to be credited that old men are more likely to foretel things then others unlesse it be by way of Revelation as Jacob did or the Pope Pius V. the Archbishop Angelo Catto Of these two last the former knew by revelation that the Christians had gain'd the battel of Lepanto the other acquainted Lewis the Sixth with the death of the Duke of Burgundy at the very hour it happened And lastly for the foresight of certaine Creatures Leonard Vair will tell us that the gesture of their bodies does not portend any thing to come but only what is present that is the humid influx of the Aire which by a naturall instinct they feel in their bodies assoon as it gathers together in the Element And as to the Birds which shift Countries according to the severall seasons of the year it is not so much out of any foresight in them of Spring Winter or Autume as a certain knowledge of those vicissitudes according to the naturall alteration of their bodies proceeding meerly from heat and cold or some other quality unknown to us This premis'd I leave those to judge who are not over-easily drawn in to embrace opinions without any reason or gronnd what esteem should be had of these fine Centuries which are so ambiguous and contradictory so obscure and enigmaticall that it were no miracle if among a thousand tetrasticks whereof every one speakes commonly of five or six severall things and particularly such as ordinarily happen there comes in a Hemistick mentioning the taking of a Town in France or the death of a Grandee in Italy a plague in Spaine a Monster a great fire a victory or something of this nature as if those Emergencies were extraordinary and happen'd not at one time or other And yet this is the main motive of that little hope there is to see these prophecyes veryfi'd as being such as we cannot compare to any thing more fitly then to Therameâ—es's shooe which fitted all feet or that Lesbian rule which being of Lead bent it self to all figures concave oblique round and Cylindricall So may we say of this Authour that his maine designe was so to write as to avoid a clear and intelligible sense that Posterity might interpret his predictions as they pleas'd For though John Aime Chavigni one that of all others hath foolishly trifled away his paines upon all kinds of Prophecyes hath shewn in his French Janus that the greatest part of Nostradamus's predictions are accomplish'd near thirty years since yet are they still brought upon the stage when any thing remarkable falls out as for Instance those that are scatter'd abroad upon the death of the Marshall d' Ancre the great fortune of Monsieur de Luynes and the firing of the Palace and the Bridges of Paris And indeed that there are not found some upon all occasions is only because men will not be at the paines to search them out since they met with something about that imaginary monstrous fish which some years since was sold up and down in effigie and that the Author of a little book called The Chymist or French Conserver sayes very ingenuously pag. 15. that Nostradamus had spoken of him above thirty four years before he was born quoting him by his name and Armes in the 31. tetrastick of the 6th Century La Lune au plein de Nuict sur le haut mont Le nouveau Sophe d' un seul cerveau l' a veuë This he is so confident of that he affirmes it cannot possibly be meant of any other then himself for certain reasons by him layd down in the said Book But because it may be objected that the Author of the French Janus who translated divers of the Centuries into Latine verse does by the explication he makes of them evince the truth at least of some of those tetrasticks consequently that I ought not so farre to discredit them especially those whose events are yet uncertain I shall briefly answer and withall conclude this Chapter with that excellent passage of Seneca Patere etiam aliquando Mathematicos vera dicere tot sagittas cum emittant unam tangere aberrantibus caeteris To which adde that of Phanorinus in Gellius that ista omnia quae aut temerè aut astutè vera dicunt prae caeteris quae mentiuntur pars ea non sit millesima CHAP. XVII Of St. Thomas Roger Bacon Bungey Michael the Scot Johannes Picus and Trithemius I Have sometimes wondered there
in the first book of Kings concerning the Image which Michol put into the bed in David's place For R. Eleazar holds that it was made of the head of a male child the first born and that dead-born under whose tongue they applyed a Lamen of Gold whereon were engrav'd the Characters and Inscriptions of certain Planets which the Jews superstitiously wandred up and down with instead of the Urim and Thummim or the Ephod of the high Priest And that this Original is true and well deduc'd there is a manifest indicium in that Henry d' Assia and Bartholomaeus Sibillus affirm that the Androides of Albertus and the Head made by Virgil were compos'd of flesh and bone yet not by Nature but by Art But this being judged impossible by modern Authors and the vertue of Images Annulets and Planetary Sigills being in great reputation men have thought ever since taking their opinion from Trismegistus affirming in his Asclepion that of the Gods some were made by the Soveraign God and others by men who by some Art had the power to unite the invisible Spirits to things visible and corporeal as he is explain'd at large by by St. Augustine that such Figures were made of Copper or some other Mettal whereon men had wrought under some favourable Aspects of Heaven and the Planets Which opinion since it is the more common it is fit we earnestly buckle with and shew that it was not without reason refuted by St. Thomas William of Paris Niphus as false absurd and erronious To prove this the more easily we are to presuppose that speech is the action of some thing that is living and is not perform'd but by the voice which is defin'd by St. Thomas after Aristotle Sonus ab ore animalis prolatus For it must needs be granted that if these Heads spoke it was either because they were living and animate or that the Daemons spake in them If the former the Soul whereby they did it must be vegetative sensitive or rational It could not be vegetative because according to the faculties of the said Soul such bodies should be ranked among Plants be nourish'd increase and produce their like It could not be sensitive for that besides the faculties of the vegetative Soul it presupposes two more which are particular to it and never granted to those Statues Much lesse then can it be rational unlesse we grant withal that they could apprehend the Species of things discourse remember them and in a word be like us Moreover if these Heads and Statues were really such that is living and animate it was either by an accidental form or a substantiall not the first at least according to the opinion of all Philosophers who will never grant that to discourse to speak to teach to foresee what is to come and such effects can depend on an accident and not on a Substance The latter is lesse possible because such Statues could not receive that substantial form till they had been devested of what they had before which there is no colour to imagine they should have done by a simple transmutation of figure since the form of the copper and of their matter was still such as it was wont to be Further I would gladly know where was their motion the first indicium of life where their senses the sluces of all knowledge and in a word not to ravel our selves into thousands of difficulties arising from the original and operation of that Soul where were the Parts and Organs necessary for their discourse and ratiocination Nor does it availe any thing to grant that the Daemons have spoken in them for it must be done either as the Soul does in our Body by the assistance of its Organs or as one should do that answers in a Chest or some broken pot The former way is impossible such Statues being not furnish'd with Muscles Lungs an Epiglottis and what is requisite to a perfect articulation of the Voice The latter is as ridiculous for if it be true why should those men take such pains to make a Man rather than a Trumpet or a Head rather than a Bottle since the Devil might as well answer by the one as the other and that if he hath heretofore uttered his Oracles in Statues it was to engage men to adore them to the contempt of their Creator whereas there is not the least mention of any Idolatry in the Stories of this Androides and these fine Heads So that we may well conclude with the Royal Prophet The Idols of the Gentiles are Silver and Gold they have mouths and speak not nor is there any breath in their nostrils all we have to do the reasons of Trismegistus being fully refuted by Niphus being to satisfy the Authority of Tostatus one of the most ancient and most authentick Patrons of Albertus's Androides that so we may at length give a final sentence against the vanity of all these Fables and pernicious falsities I must indeed confesse that Tostatus was the most learned nay the miracle if I may so expresse my self of the learned men of his age since that being Counsellour to the King great Referendary of Spain and Professour in Salamanca of Philosophy Divinity Civil and Canon Law and all at the same time he hath neverthelesse written such large and laborious Commentaries that were we not certain he dy'd at forty they were enough to perswade us he had liv'd an entire age But when I find him affirming therein many things justly accounted fabulous by the World as for instance what is said concerning the birth of the Prophet Merlin the Magick of Virgil a brasen head that discover'd the Jewes in Spain a certain earth in Hebron that was good to eat the Androides of Albertus Magnus and abundance of the like I cannot but look on them as so many black patches of his humanity nay if we appeal to Scaliger we must ingenuously acknowledge that hoc ostentationis vitium fuit magnis viris ut globatim congererent omnia non ut nihil reliquisse sed ut nihil nescivisse viderentur To re-inforce which Argument if any shall with Aristotle insist that common report cannot be absolutely false and consequently that so many Authors would not have spoken of the Androides of Albertus if something had not been in the wind I shall finally answer That my design is only to shew that he could not by the help of superstitious Magick make a Statue that should give him answers in an intelligible and articulate voice upon all the doubts and difficulties he propos'd thereto as well of things present as to come and not absolutely to deny that he might compose some Head or Statue of man like that of Memnon from which proceeded a small sound and pleasant noise when the rising Sun came by his heat to rarify and force out by certain small Conduits the aire which in the cold of the night was condens'd within it Or haply they