Concerning the method of causing these
illusory transmutations it may further be asked: whether the devils
are then inside the bodies and heads of those who are deceived, and
whether the latter are to be considered as possessed by devils; how
it can happen without injury to the inner perceptions and faculties
that a mental image is transferred from one inner faculty to another;
and whether or not such work ought to be considered miraculous.
First we must again refer to a distinction
between such illusory glamours; for sometimes the outer perceptions
only are affected, and sometimes the inner perceptions are deluded
and so affect the outer perceptions.
In the former case the glamour can be caused without the devils'
entering into the outer perceptions, and merely by an exterior
illusion; as when the interposition of some other body, or in some
other way; or when he himself assumes a body and imposes himself on
the vision.
But in the latter case it
is necessary that he must first occupy the head and the faculties.
And this is proved by authority and by reason.
And it is not a valid objection to say that two created
spirits cannot be in one and the same place, and that the soul
pervades the whole of the body. For on this question there is the
authority of S. John Damascene, when he says: Where the Angel is,
there he operates. And S. Thomas, in the Second Book of Sentences,
dist. 7, art. 5, says: All Angels, good and bad, by their natural
power, which is superior to all bodily power, are able to transmute
our bodies.
And this is clearly true,
not only by reason of the superior nobility of their nature, but
because the whole mechanism of the world and all corporeal creatures
are administered by Angels; as S. Gregory says in the 4th Dialogue:
In this visible world nothing can be disposed except by an invisible
creature. Therefore all corporeal matters are governed by the Angels,
who are also called, not only by the Holy Doctors but also by all the
Philosophers, the Powers which move the stars. It is clear also from
the fact that all human bodies are moved by their souls, just as all
other matter is moved by the stars and the Powers which move them.
Any who wish may refer to S. Thomas in the First Part, Quest. 90,
art. 1.
From this it is concluded
that, since devils operates there where they are, therefore when they
confuse the fancy and the inner perceptions they are existing in
them.
Again, although to enter the
soul is possible only to God Who created it, yet devils can, with
God's permission, enter our bodies; and they an then make impressions
on the inner faculties corresponding to the bodily organs. And by
those impressions the organs are affected in proportion as the inner
perceptions are affected in the way which has been shown: that the
devil can draw out some image retained in a faculty corresponding to
one of the senses; as he draws from the memory, which is in the back
part of the head, an image of a horse, and locally moves that
phantasm to the middle part of the head, where are the cells of
imaginative power; and finally to the sense of reason, which is in
the front of the head. And he causes such a sudden change and
confusion, that such objects are necessarily thought to be actual
things seen with the eyes. This can be clearly exemplified by the
natural defect in frantic men and other maniacs.
But if it is asked how he can do this without causing pain in
the head, the answer is easy. For in the first place he does not
cause any actual physical change in the organs, but only moves the
mental images. And secondly, he does not effect these changes by
injecting any active quality which would necessarily cause pain,
since the devil is himself without any corporeal quality, and can
therefore operate without the use of any such quality. Thirdly, as
has been said, he effects these transmutations only by a local
movement from one organ to another, and not by other movements
through which painful transformations are sometimes caused.
And as for the objection that two spirits cannot
separately exist in the same place, and that, since the soul exists
in the head, how can a devil be there also? It is to be said that the
soul is thought to reside in the centre of the heart, in which it
communicates with all the members by an outpouring of life. An
example can be taken from a spider, which feels in the middle of its
web when any part of the web is touched.
However, S. Augustine says in his book On the Spirit and Soul,
that it is all in all, and all in every part of the body. Granting
that the soul is in the head, still the devil can work there; for his
work is different from the work of the soul. The work of the soul is
in the body, to inform it and fill it with life; so that it exists
not merely locally, but in the whole matter. But the devil works in
such a part and such a place of the body, effecting his changes in
respect of the mental images. Therefore, since there is no confusion
between their respective operations, they can both exist together in
the same part of the body.
There is
also the question whether such men are to be considered obsessed or
frenzied, that is, possessed of devils. But this is considered
separately; namely, whether it is possible through the work of
witches for a man to be obsessed with a devil, that is, that the
devil should actually and bodily possess him. And this question is
specially discussed in the following chapter, since it has this
special difficulty, namely, whether this can be caused through the
operations of witches.
But as to the
question whether the temporal works of witches and devils are to be
considered as miracles or of a miraculous nature; it is to be said
that they are so, in so far as they are beyond the order of created
nature as known to us, and are done by creatures unknown to us. But
they are not properly speaking miracles as are those which are
outside the whole of created nature; as are the miracles of God and
the Saints. (See what was written in the First Part of this work, in
the Fifth Question, in the refutation of the third error.)
But there are those who object that this sort of
work must not be considered miracles, but simply works of the devil;
since the purpose of miracles is the strengthening of the Faith, and
they must not be conceded to the adversary of the Faith. And also
because the signs of Antichrist are called lying signs by the
Apostle.
First it is to be said that
to work miracles is the gift of freely given grace. And they can be
done by bad men and bad spirits, up to the limits of the power which
is in them.
Wherefore the miracles
wrought by the good can be distinguished from those wrought by the
wicked in at least three ways. First, the signs which are given by
the good are done by Divine power in such matters as are beyond the
capacity of their own natural power, such as raising the dead, and
things of that sort, which the devils are not able to accomplish in
truth, but only by an illusion: so Simon Magus moved the head of a
dead man; but such manifestations cannot last long. Secondly, they
can be distinguished by their utility; for the miracles of the good
are of a useful nature, as the healing of sickness, and such things.
But the miracles done by witches are concerned with harmful and idle
things; as when they fly in the air, or benumb the limbs of men, or
such things. And S. Peter assigns this difference in the Itinerarium
of Clement.
The third difference
relates to the Faith. For the miracles of the good are ordained for
the edification of the Faith and of good living; whereas the miracles
of the wicked are manifestly detrimental to the Faith and to
righteousness.
They are distinguished
also by the way in which they are done. For the good do miracles in a
pious and reverent invocation of the Divine Name. But witches and
wicked men work them by certain ravings and invocations of devils.
And there is no difficulty in the fact that the
Apostle called the works of the devil and Antichrist lying wonders;
for the marvels so done by Divine permission are true in some
respects and false in others. They are true in so far as they are
within the limits of the devil's power. But they are false when he
appears to do things which are beyond his power, such as raising the
dead, or making the blind to see. For when he appears to do the
former, he either enters into the dead body or else removes it, and
himself takes its place in an assumed aerial body; and in the latter
case he takes away the sight by a glamour, and then suddenly restores
it by taking away the disability he has caused, not by bringing light
to the inner perceptions, as is told in the legend of Bartholomew.
Indeed all the marvellous works of Antichrist and of witches can be
said to be lying signs, insasmuch as their only purpose is to
deceive. See S. Thomas, dist. 8, de Uirtute Daemonum.
We may also quote here the distinction which is
drawn in the Compendium of Theological Truth between a wonder and a
miracle. For in a miracle four conditions are required: that it
should be done by God; that it should be beyond the existing order of
nature; thirdly, that it should be manifest; and fourthly, that it
should be for the corroboration of the Faith. But since the works of
witches fail to fulfil at least the first and last conditions,
therefore they may be called wonderful works, but nor miracles.
It can also be argued in this way. Although
witches' works can in a sense be said to be miraculous, yet some
miracles are supernatural, some unnatural, and some preternatural.
And they are supernatural when they can be compared with nothing in
nature, or in natural power, as when a virgin gives birth. They are
unnatural when they are against the normal course of nature but do
not overstep the limits of nature, such as causing the blind to see.
And they are preternatural when they are done in a manner parallel to
that of nature, as when rods are changed into serpents; for this can
be done naturally also, through long putrefaction on account of
seminal reasons; and thus the works of magicians may be said to be
marvellous.
It is expedient to recount
an actual example, and then to explain it step by step. There is a
town in the diocese of Strasburg, the name of which it is charitable
and honourable to withhold, in which a workman was one day chopping
some wood to burn in his house. A large cat suddenly appeared and
began to attack him, and when he was driving it off, another even
larger one came and attacked him with the first more fiercely. And
when he again tried to drive them away, behold, three of them
together attacked him, jumping up at his face, and biting and
scratching his legs. In great fright and, as he said, more
panic-stricken than he had ever been, he crossed himself and, leaving
his work, fell upon the cats, which were swarming over the wood and
again leaping at his face and throat, and with difficulty drove them
away by beating one on the head, another on the legs, and another on
the back. After the space of an hour, while he was again engaged upon
his task, two servants of the town magistrates came and took him as a
malefactor and led him into the presence of the bailiff or judge. And
the judge, looking at him from a distance, and refusing to hear him,
ordered him to be thrown into the deepest dungeon of a certain tower
or prison, where those who were under sentence of death were placed.
The man cried out, and for three days bitterly complained to the
prison guards that he should suffer in that way, when he was
conscious of no crime; but the more the guards tried to procure him a
hearing, the more furious the judge became, expressing in the
strongest terms his indignation that so great a malefactor had not
yet acknowledged his crime, but dared to proclaim his innocence when
the evidence of the facts proved his horrible crime. But although
these could not prevail upon him, yet the judge was induced by the
advice of the other magistrates to grant the man a hearing. So when
he was brought out of prison into the presence of the judge, and the
judge refused to look at him, the poor man threw himself before the
knees of the other magistrates, pleading that he might know the
reason for his misfortune; and the judge broke into these words: You
most wicked of men, how can you not acknowledge your crime? At such a
time on such a day you beat three respected matrons of this town, so
that they lie in their beds unable to rise or to move. The poor man
cast his mind back to the events of that day and that hour, and said:
Never in all my life have I struck or beaten a woman, and I can prove
by credible witnesses that at that time on that day I was busy
chopping wood; and an hour afterwards your servants found me still
engaged on that task. Then the judge again exclaimed in a fury: See
how he tries to conceal his crime! The women are bewailing their
blows, they exhibit the marks, and publicly testify that he struck
them. Then the poor man considered more closely on that even, and
said: I remember that I struck some creatures at that time, but they
were not women. The magistrates in astonishment asked him to relate
what sort of creatures he had struck; and he told, to their great
amazement, all that had happened, as we have related it. So,
understanding that it was the work of the devil, they released the
poor man and let him go away unharmed, telling him not to speak of
this matter to anyone. But it could not be hidden from those devout
persons present who were zealous for the Faith.