Of The Tools The Devil Works With Witches Wizards Or Warlocks Conjurers Magicians Divines Astrologers Interpreters Of Dreams Te


Of the Tools the Devil works with, (viz.) Witches, Wizards or

Warlocks, Conjurers, Magicians, Divines, Astrologers, Interpreters

of Dreams, Tellers of Fortunes;

and above all the rest, his

particular modern Privy-Counsellors call'd Wits and Fools.





Tho', as I have advanc'd in the foregoing Chapter, the Devil has very

much chang'd Hands in his modern Management of the World
and that

instead of the Rabble and long Train of Implements reckoned up above, he

now walks about in Beaus, Beauties, Wits and Fools; yet I must not omit

to tell you that he has not dismiss'd his former Regiments, but like

Officers in Time of Peace, he keeps them all in half Pay, or like

Extraordinary Men at the Custom-House, they are kept at a Call, to be

ready to fill up Vacancies, or to employ when he is more than ordinarily

full of Business; and therefore it may not be amiss to give some brief

Account of them, from Satan's own Memoirs, their Performance being no

inconsiderable Part of his History.



Nor will it be an unprofitable Digression to go back a little to the

primitive Institution of all these Orders, for they are very antient,

and I assure you, it requires great Knowledge of Antiquity, to give a

Particular of their Original; I shall be very brief in it.



In order then to this Enquiry, you must know that it was not for want of

Servants, that Satan took this Sort of People into his Pay; he had, as I

have observ'd in its Place, Millions of diligent Devils at his Call,

whatever Business, and however difficult, he had for them to do; but as

I have said above, that our modern People are forwarder than even the

Devil himself can desire them to be; and that they come before they

are call'd, run before they are sent, and crowd themselves into his

Service; so it seems it was in those early Days, when the World was one

universal Monarchy under his Dominion, as I have at large describ'd in

its Place.



In those Days the Wickedness of the World keeping a just Pace with their

Ignorance, this inferior Sort of low priz'd Instruments did the

Devil's work mighty well; they drudg'd on in his Black-Art so

laboriously, and with such good Success, that he found it was better to

employ them as Tools to delude and draw in Mankind, than to send his

invisible Implements about, and oblige them to take such Shapes and

Dresses as were necessary upon every trifling Occasion; which, perhaps,

was more Cost than Worship, more Pains than Pay.



Having then a Set of these Voluntiers in his Service, the true Devil

had nothing to do but to keep an exact Correspondence with them, and

communicate some needful Powers to them, to make them be and do

something extraordinary, and give them a Reputation in their Business;

and these, in a Word, did a great Part of, nay almost all the Devil's

Business in the World.



To this Purpose gave he them Power, if we may believe old Glanville,

Baxter, Hicks, and other learn'd Consultors of Oracles, to walk

invisible, to fly in the Air, ride upon Broom-sticks, and other Wooden

Gear, to interpret Dreams, answer Questions, betray Secrets, to talk

(Gibberish) the universal Language, to raise Storms, sell Winds, bring

up Spirits, disturb the Dead, and torment the Living, with a thousand

other needful Tricks to amuse the World, keep themselves in Veneration,

and carry on the Devil's Empire in the World.



The first Nations among whom these infernal Practices were found, were

the Chaldeans; and that I may do Justice in earnest, as well as in

jest, it must be allow'd that the Chaldeans, or those of them so

call'd, were not Conjurers or Magicians, only Philosophers and Studiers

of Nature, wise, sober and studious Men at first, and we have an

extraordinary Account of them; and if we may believe some of our best

Writers of Fame, Abraham was himself famous among them for such

Magick, as Sir Walter Raleigh expresses it, Qui Contemplatione

Creaturarum Cognovit Creatorem.



Now granting this, it is all to my Purpose, namely, that the Devil drew

these wise Men in, to search after more Knowledge than Nature could

instruct them in; and the Knowledge of the true God being at that Time

sunk very low, he debauch'd them all with Dreams, Apparitions,

Conjurers, &c. till he ruin'd the just Notions they had, and made

Devils of them all, like himself.



The learned Senensis, speaking of this Chaldean Kind of Learning,

gives us an Account of five Sorts of them; you will pardon me for being

so grave as to go this Length back.



1. Chascedin or Chaldeans, properly so call'd, being

Astronomers.



2. Asaphim or Magicians, such was Zoroastres and Balaam the

Son of Beor.



3. Chatumim or Interpreters of Dreams and hard Speeches,

Inchanters, &c.



4. Mecasphim or Witches, call'd at first Prophets, afterwards

Malefici or Venefici, Poisoners.



5. Gazarim or Auruspices, and Diviners, such as divin'd by the

Entrails of Beasts, the Liver in particular; mention'd in Ezek.

or as others, call'd Augurs.





Now, as to all these, I suppose, I may do them no wrong, if I say,

however justifiable they were in the Beginning, the Devil got them all

into his Service at last, and that brings me to my Text again, from

which the rest was a Digression.



1. The Chascedin or Chaldean Astronomers turned Astrologers,

Fortune-Tellers, Calculators of Nativities, and vile Deluders of

the People, as if the Wisdom of the holy God was in them, as

Nebuchadnezzar said of Daniel on that very Account.



2. The Asaphim or Magi, or Magicians; Sixtus Senensis says,

they were such as wrought by Covenants with Devils, but turn'd to

it from their Wisdom, which was to study the practical Part of

Natural Philosophy, working admirable Effects by the mutual

Application of Natural Causes.



3. The Chartumim from being Reasoners or Disputers upon difficult

Points in Philosophy, became Enchanters and Conjurers. So,



4. The Mecasphim or Prophets, they turn'd to be Sorcerers,

Raisers of Spirits, such as wounded by an evil Eye, and by bitter

Curses, and were afterwards fam'd for having familiar Converse with

the Devil, and were called Witches.



5. The Gazarim, from the bare observing of the good and bad

Omens, by the Entrails of Beasts, flying of Birds, &c. were

turn'd to Sacrists or Priests of the Heathen Idols and Sacrificers.





Thus, I say, first or last the Devil engross'd all the Wise-Men of the

East, for so they are call'd; made them all his own, and by them he

work'd Wonders, that is, he fill'd the World with lying Wonders, as if

wrought by these Men, when indeed it was all his own, from Beginning to

the End, and set on Foot meerly to propagate Delusion, impose upon

blinded and ignorant Men; the God of this World blinded their Minds, and

they were led away by the Subtilty of the Devil, to say no worse of

it, till they became Devils themselves, as to Mankind; for they

carried on the Devil's Work upon all Occasions, and the Race of them

still continue in other Nations, and some of them among our selves, as

we shall see presently.



The Arabians follow'd the Chaldeans in this Study, while it was kept

within its due Bounds, and after them the Egyptians; and among the

Latter we find that Jannes and Jambres were famous for their leading

Pharaoh by their pretended magic Performances, to reject the real

Miracles of Moses; and History tells us of strange Pranks the

Wise-Men, the Magicians and the Southsayers plaid to delude the People

in the most early Ages of the World.



But, as I say, now, the Devil has improv'd himself, so he did then;

for the Grecian and Roman Heathen Rites coming on, they outdid all

the Magicians and Southsayers, by establishing the Devil's lying

Oracles, which, as a Master-Piece of Hell, did the Devil more Honour,

and brought more Homage to him, than ever he had before, or could arrive

to since.



Again, as by the setting up the Oracles, all the Magicians and

Southsayers grew out of Credit; so at the ceasing of those Oracles, the

Devil was fain to go back to the old Game again, and take up with the

Agency of Witches, Divinations, Inchantments and Conjurings, as I hinted

before, answerable to the four Sorts mention'd in the Story of

Nebuchadnezzar, (viz.) Magicians, Astrologers, the Chaldeans and

the Southsayers: How these began to be out of Request, I have

mention'd already; but as the Devil has not quite given them over,

only laid them aside a little for the present, we may venture to ask

what they were, and what Use he made of them when he did employ them.



The Truth is, I think, as it was a very mean Employment for any thing

that wears a human Countenance to take up, so I must acknowledge, I

think, 'twas a mean low priz'd Business for Satan to take up with;

below the very Devil; below his Dignity as an Angelic, tho' condemn'd

Creature; below him even as a Devil; to go to talk to a parcel of

ugly, deform'd, spiteful, malicious old Women; to give them Power to do

Mischief, who never had a Will, after they enter'd into the State of

old Woman-Hood, to do any thing else: Why the Devil always chose the

ugliest old Women he could find; whether Wizardism made them ugly,

that were not so before, and whether the Ugliness, as it was a Beauty in

Witchcraft, did not encrease according to the meritorious Performance in

the Black-Trade? These are all Questions of Moment to be decided, (if

human Learning can arrive to so much Perfection) in Ages to come.



Some say the evil Eye and the wicked Look were Parts of the Enchantment,

and that the Witches, when they were in the height of their Business,

had a powerful Influence with both; that by looking upon any Person they

could bewitch them, and make the Devil, as the Scots express it,

ride through them booted and spurr'd; and that hence came that very

significant Saying, to look like a Witch.



The strange Work which the Devil has made in the World, by this Sort

of his Agents call'd Witches, is such, and so extravagantly wild, that

except our Hope that most of those Tales happen not to be true, I know

not how any one could be easy to live near a Widow after she was five

and fifty.



All the other Sorts of Emissaries which Satan employs, come short of

these Ghosts; and Apparitions sometimes come and shew themselves, on

particular Accounts, and some of those Particulars respect doing

Justice, repairing Wrongs, preventing Mischief; sometimes in Matters

very considerable, and on Things so necessary to publick Benefit, that

we are tempted to believe they proceed from some vigilant Spirit who

wishes us well; but on the other Hand, these Witches are never concern'd

in any thing but Mischief; nay, if what they do portends good to one, it

issues in hurt to many; the whole Tenour of their Life, their Design in

general, is to do Mischief, and they are only employ'd in Mischief, and

nothing else: How far they are furnish'd with Ability suitable to the

horrid Will they are vested with, remains to be describ'd.



These Witches, 'tis said, are furnish'd with Power suitable to the

Occasion that is before them, and particularly that which deserves to be

consider'd, as Prediction, and foretelling Events, which I insist the

Author of Witchcraft is not accomplish'd with himself, nor can he

communicate it to any other: How then Witches come to be able to

foretel Things to come, which, 'tis said, the Devil himself cannot

know, and which, as I have shewn, 'tis evident he does not know himself,

is yet to be determin'd; that Witches do foretel, is certain, from the

Witch of Endor, who foretold Things to Saul, which he knew not

before, namely, that he should be slain in Battle the next Day, which

accordingly came to pass.



There are, however, and notwithstanding this particular Case, many

Instances wherein the Devil has not been able to foretel approaching

Events, and that in Things of the utmost Consequence, and he has given

certain foolish or false Answers in such Cases; the DEVIL's Priests,

which were summon'd in by the Prophet Elija, to decide the Dispute

between God and Baal, had the Devil been able to have inform'd them

of it, would certainly have receiv'd Notice from him, of what was

intended against them by Elija; that is to say, that they would be all

cut in pieces; for Satan was not such a Fool as not to know that Baal

was a Non-Entity, a Nothing, at best a dead Man, perish'd and rotting in

his Grave; for Baal was Bell or Belus, an ancient King of the

Assyrian Monarchy, and he could no more answer by Fire to consume the

Sacrifice, than he could raise himself from the dead.



But the Priests of Baal were left of their Master to their just Fate,

namely, to be a Sacrifice to the Fury of a deluded People; hence I infer

his Inability, for it would have been very unkind and ungrateful in him

not to have answer'd them, if he had been able. There is another

Argument raised here most justly against the Devil, with Relation to

his being under Restraint, and that of greater Eminence than we imagine,

and it is drawn from this very Passage, thus; 'tis not to be doubted but

that Satan, who has much of the Element put into his Hands, as Prince

of the Air, had a Power, or was able potentially speaking, to have

answer'd Baal's Priests by Fire; Fire being in Vertue of his airy

Principality a Part of his Dominion; but he was certainly withheld by

the Superior Hand, which gave him that Dominion, I mean withheld for

the Occasion only: So in another Case, it was plain that Balaam, who

was one of those Sorts of Chaldeans mention'd above, who dealt in

Divinations and Inchantments, was withheld from cursing Israel.



Some are of Opinion that Balaam was not a Witch or a Dealer with the

Devil because 'tis said of him, or rather he says it of himself, that

he saw the Visions of God, Numb. xxiv. 16. He hath said, who heard

the Words of GOD, and knew the Knowledge of the most High, which saw

the Visions of the Almighty, falling into a TRANCE, but having his

Eyes open: Hence they alledge he was one of those Magi, which St.

Augustin speaks of, de Divinatione, who by the Study of Nature, and

by the Contemplation of created Beings came to the Knowledge of the

Creature; and that Balaam's Fault was, that being tempted by the

Rewards and Honours that the King promised him, he intended to have

curs'd Israel; but when his Eyes were open'd, and that he saw they

were God's own People, he durst not do it; they will have it therefore,

that except, as above, Balaam was a good Man, or at least that he

had the Knowledge of the true God, and the Fear of that God upon him,

and that he honestly declares this, Numb. xxii. 18. If Balak would

give me his House full of Silver and Gold, I cannot go beyond the Word

of the Lord MY GOD: Where tho' he is call'd a false Prophet by some, he

evidently owns God, and assumes a Property in him, as other Prophets

did; MY GOD, and I cannot go beyond his Orders; but that which gives me

a better Opinion of Balaam than all this is, his plain Prophesy of

Christ, Chap. xxiv. 17. where he calls him the Star of Jacob, and

declares, I shall see him, but not now, I shall behold him, but not

nigh; there shall come a Star out of Jacob, and a Scepter shall rise

out of Israel, and shall smite the Corners of Moab, and destroy all

the Children of Seth, all which express not a Knowledge only, but a

Faith in Christ; but I have done preaching, this is all by the by, I

return to my Business, which is the History.



There is another Piece of dark Practice here, which lies between Satan

and his particular Agents, and which they must give us an Answer to,

when they can, which I think will not be in haste; and that is about the

obsequious Devil submitting to be call'd up into Visibility, whenever

an old Woman has her Hand cross'd with a white Six-pence, as they Call

it: One would think that instead of these vile Things call'd Witches,

being sold to the Devil, the Devil was really sold for a Slave to

them; for how far soever Satan's Residence is off of this State of Life,

they have Power, it seems, to fetch him from home, and oblige him to

come at their Call.



I can give little Account of this, only that indeed so it is; nor is the

Thing so strange in its self, as the Methods to do it are mean, foolish,

and ridiculous; as making a Circle and dancing in it, pronouncing such

and such Words, saying the Lord's Prayer backward, and the like; now is

this agreeable to the Dignity of the Prince of the Air or Atmosphere,

that he should be commanded forth with no more Pomp or Ceremony than

that of muttering a few Words, such as the old Witches and he agree

about? or is there something else in it, which none of us or themselves

understand?



Perhaps, indeed, he is always with those People call'd Witches and

Conjurers, or at least some of his Camp Volant are always present, and

so upon the least call of the Wizard, it is but putting off the misty

Cloak and showing themselves.



Then we have a Piece of mock Pageantry in bringing those Things call'd

witches or Conjurers to Justice, that is, first to know if a Woman be a

Witch, throw her into a Pond, and if she be a Witch, she will swim, and

it is not in her own Power to prevent it; if she does all she can to

sink her self, it will not do, she will swim like a Cork. Then that a

Rope will not hang a Witch, but you must get a With, a green Osyer; that

if you nail a Horse-Shoe on the Sill of the Door, she cannot come into

the House, or go out, if she be in; these and a thousand more, too

simple to be believ'd, are yet so vouch'd, so taken for granted, and so

universally receiv'd for Truth, that there is no resisting them without

being thought atheistical.



What Methods to take to know, who are Witches, I really know not; but

on the other Side, I think there are variety of Methods to be used to

know who are not; W--- G---, Esq; is a Man of Fame, his Parts are

great, because his Estate is so; he has threescore and eight Lines of

Virgil by rote, and they take up many of the Intervals of his merry

Discourses; he has just as many witty Stories to please Society; when

they are well told, once over, he begins again, and so he lives in a

round of Wit and Learning; he is a Man of great Simplicity and

Sincerity; you must be careful not to mistake my Meaning, as to the Word

Simplicity; some take it to mean Honesty, and so do I, only that it has

a Negative attending it, in his particular Case; in a Word, W----

G---- is an honest Man, and no Conjurer; a good Character, I think,

and without Impeachment to his Understanding, he may be a Man of Worth

for all that; take the other Sex, there is the Lady H---- is another

Discovery; bless us! what Charms in that Face! How bright those Eyes!

How flowing white her Breasts! How sweet her Voice? add to all, how

heavenly, divinely good her Temper! How inimitable her Behaviour! How

spotless her Virtue! How perfect her Innocence! and to sum up her

Character, we may add, the Lady H---- is no Witch; sure none of our

Beau Critics will be so unkind now as to censure me in those honest

Descriptions, as if I meant that my good Friend W---- G---- Esq; or my

ador'd Angel, the bright, the charming Lady H---- were Fools; but what

will not those Savages, call'd Critics, do, whose barbarous Nature

enclines them to trample on the brightest Characters, and to cavil on

the clearest Expressions?



It might be expected of me, however, in justice to my Friends, and to

the bright Characters of abundance of Gentlemen of this Age, who, by the

Depth of their Politics, and the Height of their Elevations might be

suspected, and might give us Room to charge them with Subterranean

Intelligence; I say, it might be expected that I should clear up their

Fame, and assure the World concerning them, even by Name, that they are

no Conjurers, that they do not deal with the Devil, at least, not by

the Way Witchcraft and Divination, such as Sir T---k, E--- B---,

Esq; my Lord Homily, Coll. Swagger, Jeoffry Well with, Esq; Capt.

Harry Go Deeper, Mr. Wellcome Woollen, Citizen and Merchant Taylor

of London, Henry Cadaver, Esq; the D---- of Caerfilly, the

Marquess of Sillyhoo, Sir Edward Thro' and Thro' Bart. and a World

of fine Gentlemen more, whose great Heads and Weighty Understandings

have given the World such Occasion to challenge them with being at least

descended from the Magi, and perhaps engaged with old Satan in his

Politics and Experiments; but I, that have such good Intelligence among

Satan's Ministers of State, as is necessary to the present

Undertaking, am thereby well able to clear up their Characters: and I

doubt not, but they will value themselves upon it, and acknowledge

their Obligation to me, for letting the World know the Devil does not

pretend to have had any Business with them, or to have enroll'd them in

the List of his Operators; in a Word, that none of them are

Conjurers: Upon which Testimony of mine, I expect they be no longer

charg'd with, or so much as suspected of having an unlawful Quantity of

Wit, or having any Sorts of it about them, that are contraband or

prohibited, but that for the future they pass unmolested, and be taken

for nothing but what they are, (viz.) very honest worthy Gentlemen.



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