Witch, Warlock, and Magician Part 1

Witch, Warlock, and Magician.

by William Henry Davenport Adams.

PREFACE.

The following pages may be regarded as a contribution towards that 'History of Human Error' which was undertaken by Mr. Augustine Caxton.

I fear that many minds will have to devote all their energies to the work, if it is ever to be brought to completion; and, indeed, it may plausibly be argued that its completion would be an impossibility, since every generation adds something to the melancholy record--'pulveris exigui parva munera.' However this may be, little more remains to be said on the subjects which I have here considered from the standpoint of a sympathetic though incredulous observer.

Alchemy, Magic, Witchcraft--how exhaustively they have been investigated will appear from the list of authorities which I have drawn up for the reader's convenience. They have been studied by 'adepts,' and by critics, as realities and as delusions; and almost the last word would seem to have been said by Science--though not on the side of the adepts, who still continue to dream of the Hermetic philosophy, to lose themselves in fanciful pictures, theurgic and occult, and to write about the mysteries of magic with a simplicity of faith which we may wonder at, but are bound to respect.

It has not been my purpose, in the present volume, to attempt a general history of magic and alchemy, or a scientific inquiry into their psychological aspects. I have confined myself to a sketch of their progress in England, and to a narrative of the lives of our princ.i.p.al magicians. This occupies the first part. The second is devoted to an historical review of witchcraft in Great Britain, and an examination into the most remarkable Witch-Trials, in which I have endeavoured to bring out their peculiar features, presenting much of the evidence adduced, and in some cases the so-called confessions of the victims, in the original language. I believe that the details, notwithstanding the reticence imposed upon me by considerations of delicacy and decorum, will surprise the reader, and that he will readily admit the profound interest attaching to them, morally and intellectually. I have added a chapter on the 'Literature of Witchcraft,' which, I hope, is tolerably exhaustive, and now offer the whole as an effort to present, in a popular and readable form, the result of careful and conscientious study extending over many years.

W. H. D. A.

INTRODUCTION.

PROGRESS OF ALCHEMY IN EUROPE.

The word ??e?a--from which we derive our English word 'chemistry'--first occurs, it is said, in the Lexicon of Suidas, a Greek writer who flourished in the eleventh century. Here is his definition of it:

'Chemistry is the art of preparing gold and silver. The books concerning it were sought out and burnt by Diocletian, on account of the new plots directed against him by the Egyptians. He behaved towards them with great cruelty in his search after the treatises written by the ancients, his purpose being to prevent them from growing rich by a knowledge of this art, lest, emboldened by measureless wealth, they should be induced to resist the Roman supremacy.'

Some authorities a.s.sert, however, that this art, or pretended art, is of much greater antiquity than Suidas knew of; and Scaliger refers to a Greek ma.n.u.script by Zozomen, of the fifth century, which is ent.i.tled 'A Faithful Description of the Secret and Divine Art of Making Gold and Silver.' We may a.s.sume that as soon as mankind had begun to set an artificial value upon these metals, and had acquired some knowledge of chemical elements, their combinations and permutations, they would entertain a desire to multiply them in measureless quant.i.ties. Dr.

Shaw speaks of no fewer than eighty-nine ancient ma.n.u.scripts, scattered through the European libraries, which are all occupied with 'the chemical art,' or 'the holy art,' or, as it is sometimes called, 'the philosopher's stone'; and a fair conclusion seems to be that 'between the fifth century and the taking of Constantinople in the fifteenth, the Greeks believed in the possibility of making gold and silver,' and called the supposed process, or processes, _chemistry_.

The delusion was taken up by the Arabians when, under their Aba.s.side Khalifs, they entered upon the cultivation of scientific knowledge.

The Arabians conveyed it into Spain, whence its diffusion over Christendom was a simple work of time, sure if gradual. From the eleventh to the sixteenth century, alchemy was more or less eagerly studied by the scholars of Germany, Italy, France, and England; and the volumes in which they recorded both their learning and their ignorance, the little they knew and the more they did not know, compose quite a considerable library. One hundred and twenty-two are enumerated in the 'Bibliotheca Chemica Curiosa,' of Mangetus, a dry-as-dust kind of compilation, in two huge volumes, printed at Geneva in 1702. Any individual who has time and patience to expend _ad libitum_, cannot desire a fairer field of exercise than the 'Bibliotheca.' One very natural result of all this vain research and profitless inquiry was a keen anxiety on the part of victims to dignify their labours by claiming for their 'sciences, falsely so-called,' a venerable and mysterious origin. They accordingly a.s.serted that the founder or creator was Hermes Trismegistus, whom some of them professed to identify with Chanaan, the son of Ham, whose son Mizraim first occupied and peopled Egypt. Now, it is clear that any person might legitimately devote his nights and days to the pursuit of a science invented, or originally taught, by no less ill.u.s.trious an ancient than Hermes Trismegistus. But to clothe it with the awe of a still greater antiquity, they affirmed that its principles had been discovered, engraved in Phnician characters, on an emerald tablet which Alexander the Great exhumed from the philosopher's tomb. Unfortunately, as is always the case, the tablet was lost; but we are expected to believe that two Latin versions of the inscription had happily been preserved. One of these may be Englished as hereinunder:

1. I speak no frivolous things, but only what is true and most certain.

2. What is below resembles that which is above, and what is above resembles that which is below, to accomplish the one thing of all things most wonderful.

3. And as all things proceeded from the meditation of the One G.o.d, so were all things generated from this one thing by the disposition of Nature.

4. Its father is _Sol_, its mother _Luna_; it was engendered in the womb by the air, and nourished by the earth.

5. It is the cause of all the perfection of things throughout the whole world.

6. It arrives at the highest perfection of powers if it be reduced into earth.

7. Separate the earth from the fire, the subtle from the gross, acting with great caution.

8. Ascend with the highest wisdom from earth to heaven, and thence descend again to earth, and bind together the powers of things superior and things inferior. So shall you compa.s.s the glory of the whole world, and divest yourself of the abjectness of humanity.

9. This thing has more fort.i.tude than fort.i.tude itself, since it will overcome everything subtle and penetrate everything solid.

10. All that the world contains was created by it.

11. Hence proceed things wonderful which in this wise were established.

12. For this reason the name of Hermes Trismegistus was bestowed upon me, because I am master of three parts of the philosophy of the whole world.

13. This is what I had to say concerning the most admirable process of the chemical art.

These oracular utterances are so vague and obscure that an enthusiast may read into them almost any meaning he chooses; but there seems a general consensus of opinion that they refer to the 'universal medicine' of the earlier alchemists. This, however, is of no great importance, since it is certain they were invented by some ingenious hand as late as the fifteenth century. Another forgery of a similar kind is the 'Tractatus Aureus de Lapidis Physici Secretis,' also attributed to Hermes; it professes to describe the process of making this 'universal medicine,' or 'philosopher's stone,' and the formulary is thus translated by Thomson:

'Take of moisture an ounce and a half; of meridional redness--that is, the soul of the sun--a fourth part, that is, half an ounce; of yellow sage likewise half an ounce; and of auripigmentum half an ounce; making in all three ounces.'

Such a recipe does not seem to help forward an enthusiastic student to any material extent.

THE EARLIER ALCHEMISTS.

It is in the erudite writings of the great Arabian physician, Gebir--that is, Abu Moussah Djafar, surnamed _Al Sofi_, or The Wise--that the science of alchemy, or chemistry (at first the two were identical), first a.s.sumes a definite shape. Gebir flourished in the early part of the eighth century, and wrote, it is said, upwards of five hundred treatises on the philosopher's stone and the elixir of life. In reference to the latter mysterious potion, which possessed the wonderful power of conferring immortal youth on those who drank of it, one may remark that it was the necessary complement of the philosopher's stone, for what would be the use of an unlimited faculty of making gold and silver unless one could be sure of an immortality in which to enjoy its exercise? Gebir's princ.i.p.al work, the 'Summae Perfectionis,' containing instructions for students in search of the two great secrets, has been translated into several European languages; and an English version, by Richard Russell, the alchemist, was published in 1686.

Gebir lays down, as a primary principle, that all metals are compounds of mercury and sulphur. They all labour under disease, he says, except gold, which is the one metal gifted with perfect health. Therefore, a preparation of it would dispel every ill which flesh is heir to, as well as the maladies of plants. We may excuse his extravagances, however, in consideration of the services he rendered to science by his discovery of corrosive sublimate, red oxide of mercury, white oxide of a.r.s.enic, nitric acid, oxide of copper, and nitrate of silver, all of which originally issued from Gebir's laboratory.

Briefly speaking, the hypothesis a.s.sumed by the alchemists was this: all the metals are compounds, and the baser contain the same elements as gold, contaminated, indeed, with various impurities, but capable, when these have been purged away, of a.s.suming all its properties and characters. The substance which was to effect this purifying process they called the philosopher's stone (_lapis philosophorum_), though, as a matter of fact, it is always described as a _powder_--a powder red-coloured, and smelling strongly. Few of the alchemists, however, venture on a distinct statement that they had discovered or possessed this substance.

The arch-quack Paracelsus makes the a.s.sertion, of course; unblus.h.i.+ng mendacity was part of his stock-in-trade; and he pretends even to define the methods by which it may be realized. Unfortunately, to ordinary mortals his description is absolutely unintelligible. Others there are who affirm that they had seen it, and seen it in operation, trans.m.u.ting lead, quicksilver, and other of the inferior metals into ruddy gold. One wonders that they did not claim a share in a process which involved such boundless potentialities of wealth!

Helvetius, the physician, though no believer in the magical art, tells the following wild story in his 'Vitulus Aureus':

On December 26, 1666, a stranger called upon him, and, after discussing the supposed properties of the universal medicine, showed him a yellow powder, which he declared to be the _lapis_, and also five large plates of gold, which, he said, were the product of its action. Naturally enough, Helvetius begged for a few grains of this marvellous powder, or that the stranger would at least exhibit its potency in his presence. He refused, however, but promised that he would return in six weeks. He kept his promise, and then, after much entreaty, gave Helvetius a pinch of the powder--about as much as a rape-seed. The physician expressed his fear that so minute a quant.i.ty would not convert as much as four grains of lead; whereupon the stranger broke off one-half, and declared that the remainder was more than sufficient for the purpose. During their first conference, Helvetius had contrived to conceal a little of the powder beneath his thumb-nail. This he dropped into some molten lead, but it was nearly all exhaled in smoke, and the residue was simply of a vitreous character.

On mentioning this circ.u.mstance to his visitor, he explained that the powder should have been enclosed in wax before it was thrown into the molten lead, to prevent the fumes of the lead from affecting it. He added that he would come back next day, and show him how to make the projection; but as he failed to appear, Helvetius, in the presence of his wife and son, put six drachms of lead into a crucible, and as soon as the lead was melted, flung into it the atoms of powder given to him by his mysterious visitor, having first rolled them up in a little ball of wax. At the end of a quarter of an hour he found the lead trans.m.u.ted (so he avers) into gold. Its colour at first was a deep green; but the mixture, when poured into a conical vessel, turned blood-red, and, after cooling, acquired the true tint of gold. A goldsmith who examined it p.r.o.nounced it to be genuine. Helvetius requested Purelius, the keeper of the Dutch Mint, to test its value; and two drachms, after being exposed to aquafortis, were found to have increased a couple of scruples in weight--an increase doubtlessly owing to the silver, which still remained enveloped in the gold, despite the action of the aquafortis.

It is obvious that this narrative is a complete mystification, and that either the stranger was a myth or Helvetius was the victim of a deception.

The recipes that the alchemists formulate--those, that is, who profess to have discovered the stone, or to have known somebody who enjoyed so rare a fortune--are always unintelligible or impracticable.

What is to be understood, for example, of the following elaborate process, or series of processes, which are recorded by Mangetus, in his preface to the ponderous 'Bibliotheca Chemica' (to which reference has already been made)?

1. Prepare a quant.i.ty of spirits of wine, so free from water as to be wholly combustible, and so volatile that a drop of it, if let fall, will evaporate before it reaches the ground. This const.i.tutes the first menstruum.

2. Take pure mercury, revived in the usual manner from cinnabar; put it into a gla.s.s vessel with common salt and distilled vinegar; shake violently, and when the vinegar turns black, pour it off, and add fresh vinegar. Shake again, and continue these repeated shakings and additions until the mercury no longer turns the vinegar black; the mercury will then be quite pure and very brilliant.

3. Take of this mercury four parts; of sublimed mercury (_mercurii meteoresati_--probably corrosive sublimate), prepared with your own hands, eight parts; triturate them together in a wooden mortar with a wooden pestle, till all the grains of running mercury disappear. (This process is truly described as 'tedious and rather difficult.')

4. The mixture thus prepared is to be put into a sand-bath, and exposed to a subliming heat, which is to be gradually increased until the whole sublimes. Collect the sublimed matter, put it again into the sand-bath, and sublime a second time; this process must be repeated five times. The product is a very sweet crystallized sublimate, const.i.tuting the _sal sapientum_, or wise men's salt (probably calomel), and possessing wonderful properties.

5. Grind it in a wooden mortar, reducing it to powder; put this powder into a gla.s.s retort, and pour upon it the spirit of wine (see No. 1) till it stands about three finger-breadths above the powder. Seal the retort hermetically, and expose it to a very gentle heat for seventy-four hours, shaking it several times a day; then distil with a gentle heat, and the spirit of wine will pa.s.s over, together with spirit of mercury. Keep this liquid in a well-stoppered bottle, lest it should evaporate. More spirit of wine is to be poured upon the residual salt, and after digestion must be distilled off, as before; and this operation must be repeated until all the salt is dissolved and given off with the spirit of wine. A great work will then have been accomplished! For the mercury, having to some extent been rendered volatile, will gradually become fit to receive the tincture of gold and silver. Now return thanks to G.o.d, who has. .h.i.therto crowned your wonderful work with success. Nor is this wonderful work enveloped in Cimmerian darkness; it is clearer than the sun, though preceding writers have sought to impose upon us with parables, hieroglyphs, fables, and enigmas.