The Phantom World Part 4

We have seen above what Jamblichus informs us concerning apparitions of the G.o.ds, genii, good and bad angels, heroes, and the archontes who preside over the government of the world.

Homer, the most ancient of Greek writers, and the most celebrated theologian of Paganism, relates several apparitions both of G.o.ds and heroes, and also of the dead. In the Odyssey,[77] he represents Ulysses going to consult the sorcerer Tiresias; and this diviner having prepared a grave or trench full of blood to evoke the manes, Ulysses draws his sword to prevent them from coming to drink this blood, for which they thirst; but which they were not allowed to taste before they had answered the questions put to them. They believed also that the souls of the dead could not rest, and that they wandered around their dead bodies so long as the corpse remained uninhumed.

Even after they were interred, food was offered them; above everything honey was given, as if leaving their tomb they came to taste what was offered them.[78] They were persuaded that the demons loved the smoke of sacrifices, melody, the blood of victims, and intercourse with women; that they were attached for a time to certain spots and certain edifices which they infested. They believed that souls separated from the gross and terrestrial body, preserved after death one more subtile and elastic, having the form of that they had quitted; that these bodies were luminous, and like the stars; that they retained an inclination for those things which they had loved during their life on earth, and that often they appeared gliding around their tombs.

To bring back all this to the matter here treated of, that is to say, to the appearance of good angels, we may note, that in the same manner that we attach to the apparitions of good angels the idea of tutelary spirits of kingdoms, provinces, and nations, and of each of us in particular--as, for instance, the Prince of the kingdom of Persia, or the angel of that nation, who resisted the archangel Gabriel during twenty-one days, as we read in Daniel;[79] the angel of Macedonia, who appeared to St. Paul,[80] and of whom we have spoken before; the archangel St. Michael, who is considered as the chief of the people of G.o.d and the armies of Israel;[81] and the guardian angels deputed by G.o.d to guide us and guard us all the days of our life--so we may say that the Greeks and Romans, being Gentiles, believed that certain sorts of spirits, which they imagined were good and beneficent, protected their kingdoms, provinces, towns, and private houses.

They paid them a superst.i.tious and idolatrous wors.h.i.+p, as to domestic divinities; they invoked them, offered them a kind of sacrifice and offerings of incense, cakes, honey, and wine, &c.--but not b.l.o.o.d.y sacrifices.[82]

The Platonicians taught that carnal and voluptuous men could not see their genii, because their mind was not sufficiently pure, nor enough disengaged from sensual things; but that men who were wise, moderate, and temperate, and who applied themselves to serious and sublime subjects, could see them; as Socrates, for instance, who had his familiar genius, whom he consulted, to whose advice he listened, and whom he beheld, at least with the eyes of the mind.

If the oracles of Greece and other countries are reckoned in the number of apparitions of bad spirits, we may also recollect the good spirits who have announced things to come, and have a.s.sisted the prophets and inspired persons, whether in the Old Testament or the New. The angel Gabriel was sent to Daniel[83] to instruct him concerning the vision of the four great monarchies, and the accomplishment of the seventy weeks, which were to put an end to the captivity. The prophet Zechariah says expressly that _the angel who appeared unto him_[84] revealed to him what he must say--he repeats it in five or six places; St. John, in the Apocalypse,[85] says the same thing, that G.o.d had sent his angel to inspire him with what he was to say to the Churches. Elsewhere[86] he again makes mention of the angel who talked with him, and who took in his presence the dimensions of the heavenly Jerusalem. And again, St. Paul in his Epistle to the Hebrews,[87] "If what has been predicted by the angels may pa.s.s for certain."

From all we have just said, it results that the apparitions of good angels are not only possible, but also very real; that they have often appeared, and under diverse forms; that the Hebrews, Christians, Mahometans, Greeks, and Romans have believed in them; that when they have not sensibly appeared, they have given proofs of their presence in several different ways. We shall examine elsewhere how we can explain the kind of apparition, whether of good or bad angels, or souls separated from the body.

Footnotes:

[69] Jamblic. lib. ii. cap. 3 & 5.

[70]

"Quod te per Genium, dextramque Deosque Penates, Obsecro et obtestor."--_Horat._ lib. i. Epist. 7. 94.

----"Dum cunctis supplex advolveris aris, Ei mitem Genium Domini praesentis adoras."

_Stac._ lib. v. Syl. I. 73.

[71] Antiquitee expliquee, tom. i.

[72] Perseus, Satire ii.

[73] Senec. Epist. 12.

[74] Tertull. Apol. c. 23.

[75]

"Troja vale, rapimur, clamant; dant oscula terrae Troades."--_Ovid. Metam._, lib. xiii. 421.

[76]

"Quamquam cur Genium Romae, mihi fingitis unum?

c.u.m portis, domibus; thermis, stabulis soleatis, a.s.signare suos Genios?"--_Prudent. contra Symmach._

[77] Odyss. XI. sub. fin. _Vid._ Horat. lib. i. Satire 7, &c.

[78] Virgil. aeneid. I. 6. August. Serm. 15. de SS. et Quaest. 5. in Deut. i. 5 c. 43. _Vide_ Spencer, de Leg. Hebraeor. Ritual.

[79] Dan. x. 13.

[80] Acts xvi. 9.

[81] Josh. v. 13. Dan. x. 13, 21; xii. 1. Judg. v. 6. Rev. xii. 7

[82] _Forsitan quis quaerat, quid causae sit, ut merum fundendum sit genio_, non hostiam faciendam putaverint.... _Scilicet ut die natali munus_ annale genio solverent, manum a coede ac sanguine abstinerent.--Censorin. de Die Natali, c. 2. Vide Taffin de Anno Saecul.

[83] Dan. viii. 16; ix. 21.

[84] Zech. i. 10, 13, 14, 19; ii. 3, 4; iv. 1, 4, 5; v. 5, 10.

[85] Rev. i. 1.

[86] Rev. x. 8, 9, &c.; xi. 1, 2, 3, &c.

[87] Heb. ii. 2.

CHAPTER VI.

THE APPARITION OF BAD ANGELS PROVED BY THE HOLY SCRIPTURES--UNDER WHAT FORM THEY HAVE APPEARED.

The books of the Old and New Testament, together with sacred and profane history, are full of relations of the apparition of bad spirits. The first, the most famous, and the most fatal apparition of Satan, is that of the appearance of this evil spirit to Eve, the first woman,[88] in the form of a serpent, which animal served as the instrument of that seducing demon in order to deceive her and induce her to sin. Since that time he has always chosen to appear under that form rather than any other; so in Scripture he is often termed _the Old Serpent_;[89] and it is said that the infernal dragon fought against the woman who figured or represented the church; that the archangel St. Michael vanquished him and cast him down from heaven. He has often appeared to the servants of G.o.d in the form of a dragon, and he has caused himself to be adored by unbelievers in this form, in a great number of places: at Babylon, for instance, they wors.h.i.+ped a living dragon,[90] which Daniel killed by making it swallow a ball or bolus, composed of ingredients of a mortally poisonous nature. The serpent was consecrated to Apollo, the G.o.d of physic and of oracles; and the pagans had a sort of divination by means of serpents, which they called _Ophiomantia_.

The Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans wors.h.i.+ped serpents, and regarded them as divine.[91] They brought to Rome the serpent of Epidaurus, to which they paid divine honors. The Egyptians considered vipers as divinities.[92] The Israelites adored the brazen serpent elevated by Moses in the desert,[93] and which was in after times broken in pieces by the holy king Hezekiah.[94]

St. Augustine[95] a.s.sures us that the Manichaeans regarded the serpent as the Christ, and said that this animal had opened the eyes of Adam and Eve by the bad counsel which he gave them. We almost always see the form of the serpent in the magical figures[96] _Akraxas_ and _Abrachadabra_, which were held in veneration among the Basilidian heretics, who, like the Manichaeans, acknowledge two principles in all things--the one good, the other bad; _Abraxas_ in Hebrew signifies _that bad principle_, or the father of evil; _ab-ra-achad-ab-ra_, _the father of evil_, _the sole father of evil_, or the only bad principle.

St. Augustine[97] remarks that no animal has been more subject to the effects of enchantment and magic than the serpent, as if to punish him for having seduced the first woman by his imposture.

However, the demon has usually a.s.sumed the human form when he would tempt mankind; it was thus that he appeared to Jesus Christ in the desert;[98] that he tempted him and told him to change the stones into bread that he might satisfy his hunger; that he transported him, the Saviour, to the highest pinnacle of the temple, and showed him all the kingdoms of the world, and offered him the enjoyment of them.

The angel who wrestled with Jacob at Peniel,[99] on his return from his journey into Mesopotamia, was a bad angel, according to some ancient writers; others, as Severus Sulpicius[100] and some Rabbis, have thought that it was the angel of Esau, who had come to combat with Jacob; but the greater number believe that it was a good angel.

And would Jacob have asked him for his blessing had he deemed him a bad angel? But however that fact may be taken, it is not doubtful that the demon has appeared in a human form.

Several stories, both ancient and modern, are related which inform us that the demon has appeared to those whom he wished to seduce, or who have been so unhappy as to invoke his aid, or make a compact with him, as a man taller than the common stature, dressed in black, and with a rough ungracious manner; making a thousand fine promises to those to whom he appeared, but which promises were always deceitful, and never followed by a real effect. I can even believe that they beheld what existed only in their own confused and deranged ideas.

At Molsheim,[101] in the chapel of St. Ignatius in the Jesuits'

church, may be seen a celebrated inscription, which contains the history of a young German gentleman, named Michael Louis, of the house of Boubenh.o.r.en, who, having been sent by his parents when very young to the court of the Duke of Lorraine, to learn the French language, lost all his money at cards: reduced to despair, he resolved to give himself to the demon, if that bad spirit would or could give him some good money; for he doubted that he would only furnish him with counterfeit and bad coin. As he was meditating on this idea, suddenly he beheld before him a youth of his own age, well made, well dressed, who, having asked him the cause of his uneasiness, presented him with a handful of money, and told him to try if it was good. He desired him to meet him at that place the next day.

Michael returned to his companions, who were still at play, and not only regained all the money he had lost, but won all that of his companions. Then he went in search of his demon, who asked as his reward three drops of his blood, which he received in an acorn-cup; after which, presenting a pen to Michael, he desired him to write what he should dictate. He then dictated some unknown words, which he made him write on two different bits of paper,[102] one of which remained in the possession of the demon, the other was inserted in Michael's arm, at the same place whence the demon had drawn the blood. And the demon said to him, "I engage myself to serve you during seven years, after which you will unreservedly belong to me."

The young man consented to this, though with a feeling of horror; and the demon never failed to appear to him day and night under various forms, and taught him many unknown and curious things, but which always tended to evil. The fatal termination of the seven years was approaching, and the young man was then about twenty years old. He returned to his father's house, when the demon to whom he had given himself inspired him with the idea of poisoning his father and mother, of setting fire to their chateau, and then killing himself. He tried to commit all these crimes, but G.o.d did not allow him to succeed in these attempts. The gun with which he wished to kill himself missed fire twice, and the poison did not take effect on his father and mother.

More and more uneasy, he revealed to some of his father's domestics the miserable state in which he found himself, and entreated them to procure him some succor. At the same time the demon seized him, and bent his body back, so that he was near breaking his bones. His mother, who had adopted the heresy of Suenfeld, and had induced her son to follow it also, not finding in her sect any help against the demon that possessed or obseded him, was constrained to place him in the hands of some monks. But he soon withdrew from them and retired to Islade, from whence he was brought back to Molsheim by his brother, a canon of Wurzburg, who put him again into the hands of fathers of the society. Then it was that the demon made still more violent efforts against him, appearing to him in the form of ferocious animals. One day, amongst others, the demon, wearing the form of a hairy savage, threw on the ground a schedule, or compact, different from the true one which he had extorted from the young man, to try by means of this false appearance to withdraw him from the hands of those who kept him, and prevent his making his general confession. At last they fixed on the 20th of October, 1603, as the day for being in the Chapel of St.

Ignatius, and to cause to be brought the true schedule containing the compact made with the demon. The young man there made profession of the Catholic and orthodox faith, renounced the demon, and received the holy sacrament. Then, uttering horrible cries, he said he saw as it were two he-goats of immeasurable size, which, holding up their forefeet (standing on their hindlegs), held between their claws, each one separately, one of the schedules or agreements. But as soon as the exorcisms were begun, and the priests invoked the name of St.

Ignatius, the two he-goats fled away, and there came from the left arm or hand of the young man, almost without pain, and without leaving any scar, the compact, which fell at the feet of the exorcist.

There now wanted only the second compact, which had remained in the power of the demon. They recommenced their exorcisms, and invoked St.