chapter xxi

.

[255] Matt. viii. 30.

[256] Luke xxiii. 3.

[257] Acts i. 25.

NOTES TO VOLUME II

[1] 'Treatise of Spirits.' By John Beaumont, Gent. London, 1705.

[2] Luke x. 19.

[3] Rev. xii.

[4] Rev. xii. cf. verses 4, 9 and 14.

[5] Rev. xii. 12.

[6] 'Zendavesta,' Yaçna xxx.; Max Müller, 'Science of Religion,' p. 238.

[7] Yaçna xliii.

[8] 'Die Christliche Lehre von der Sünde.' Von Julius Müller, Breslau, 1844, i. 193.

[9] 'Ormazd brought help to me; by the grace of Ormazd my troops entirely defeated the rebel army and took Sitratachmes, and brought him before me. Then I cut off his nose and his ears, and I scourged him. He was kept chained at my door. All the kingdom beheld him. Afterwards I crucified him at Arbela.' So says the tablet of Darius Hystaspes. But what could Darius have done 'by the grace of Ahriman'?

[10] Cf. Rev. v. 6 and xii. 15.

[11] 'Prayer and Work.' By Octavius B. Frothingham. New York, 1877.

[12] 'Lucifero, Poema di Mario Rapisardi.' Milano, 1877.

[13] E quanto ebbe e mantiene a l'uom soltanto Il deve, a l'uom che d'oqui sue destino O prospero, o maligno, arbitro e solo.

'Whatever he (God) had, he owed to man alone, to man who, for good or ill, is sole arbiter of his own fate.'--Rapisardi's Lucifero.

[14] The following abridgment mainly follows that of James Freeman Clarke in his 'Ten Great Religions.'

[15] White or Snowy Mountain. Cf. Alp, Elf, &c.

[16] 'Elias shall first come and restore all things.'

[17] That this satirical hymn was admitted into the Rig-Veda shows that these hymns were collected whilst they were still in the hands of the ancient Hindu families as common property, and were not yet the exclusive property of Bráhmans as a caste or association. Further evidence of the same kind is given by a hymn in which the expression occurs--'Do not be as lazy as a Bráhman.'--Mrs. Manning's Ancient and Mediæval India, i. 77. In the same work some particulars are given of the persons mentioned in this chapter. The Frog-satire is translated by Max Müller, A. S. L., p. 494.

[18] 'Arichandra, the Martyr of Truth: A Tamil Drama translated into English by Mutu Coomâra Swâmy, Mudliar, Member of Her Majesty's Legislative Council of Ceylon,' &c. London: Smith, Elder, & Co. 1863. This drama, it must be constantly borne in mind, in nowise represents the Vedic legend, told in the Aitereya-Bráhmana, vii. 13-18; nor the puranic legend, told in the Merkandeya-Purána. I have altered the spelling of the names to the Sanskrit forms, but otherwise follow Sir M. C. S.'s translation.

[19] Siva; the 'lord of the world,' and of wealth. Cf. Pluto, Dis, Dives.

[20] Thes. Heb., p. 94.

[21] Heb. Handw., p. 90.

[22] Or Jahveh. I prefer to use the best known term in a case where the more exact spelling adds no significance.

[23] This, the grandest of all the elohistic names, became the nearest Hebrew word for devils--shedim.

[24] Even his jealous command against rivals, i.e., 'graven images,' had to be taken along with the story of Laban's images (Gen. xxxi.), when, though 'God came to Laban,' the idolatry was not rebuked.

[25] It is not certain, indeed, whether this Brightness may not have been separately personified in the 'Eduth' (translated 'testimony' in the English version, Exod. xvi. 34), before which the pot of manna was laid. The word means 'brightness,' and Dr. Willis supposes it may be connected with Adod, the Phoenician Sun-god (Pentateuch, p. 186).

[26] It is important not to confuse Satan with the Devil, so far as the Bible is concerned. Satan, as will be seen when we come to the special treatment of him required, is by no means invariably diabolical. In the Book of Job, for example, he appears in a character far removed from hostility to Jehovah or goodness.

[27] Name ist Schall und Rauch, Umnebelnd Himmelsgluth.--Goethe.

[28] 'Targum to the Prophets,' Jonathan Ben Uzziel. See Deutsch's 'Literary Remains,' p. 379.

[29] See pp. 46 and 255. The episode is in Mahábhárata, I. 15.

[30] Related to the Slav Kvas, with which, in Russian folklore, the Devil tried to circumvent Noah and his wife, as related in chap. xxvii. part iv.

[31] In Sanskrit Adima means 'the first;' in Hebrew Adam (given almost always with the article) means 'the red,' and it is generally derived from adamah, mould or soil. But Professor Max Müller (Science of Religion, p. 320) says if the name Adima (used, by the way, in India for the first man, as Adam is in England) is the same as Adam, 'we should be driven to admit that Adam was borrowed by the Jews from the Hindus.' But even that mild case of 'driving' is unnecessary, since the word, as Sale reminded the world, is used in the Persian legend. It is probable that the Hebrews imported this word not knowing its meaning, and as it resembled their word for mould, they added the gloss that the first man was made of the dust or mould of the ground. It is not contended that the Hebrews got their word directly from the Hindu or Persian myth. Mr. George Smith discovered that Admi or Adami was the name for the first men in Chaldean fragments. Sir Henry Rawlinson points out that the ancient Babylonians recognised two principle races,--the Adamu, or dark, and the Sarku, or light, race; probably a distinction, remembered in the phrase of Genesis, between the supposed sons of Adam and the sons of God. The dark race was the one that fell. Mr. Herbert Spencer (Principles of Sociology, Appendix) offers an ingenious suggestion that the prohibition of a certain sacred fruit may have been the provision of a light race against a dark one, as in Peru only the Yuca and his relatives were allowed to eat the stimulating cuca. If this be true in the present case, it would still only reflect an earlier tradition that the holy fruit was the rightful possession of the deities who had won in the struggle for it.

Nor is there wanting a survival from Indian tradition in the story of Eve. Adam said, 'This now is bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh.' In the Manu Code (ix. 22) it is written: 'The bone of woman is united with the bone of man, and her flesh with his flesh.' The Indian Adam fell in twain, becoming male and female (Yama and Yami). Ewald (Hist. of Israel, i. 1) has put this matter of the relation between Hebrew and Hindu traditions, as it appears to me, beyond doubt. See also Goldziher's Heb. Mythol., p. 326; and Professor King's Gnostics, pp. 9, 10, where the historic conditions under which the importation would naturally have occurred are succinctly set forth. Professor King suggests that Parsî and Pharisee may be the same word.

[32] Gen. vi. 1, 2, 4.

[33] vi.-xi. pp. 3-6. See Drummond's 'Jewish Messiah,' p. 21.

[34] See vol. i. p. 255.

[35] Phil. Trans. Ab. from 1700-1720, Part iv. p. 173.

[36] Gen. xxi. 6, 7. The English version has destroyed the sense by supplying 'him' after 'borne.' Cf. also verses 1, 2. The rabbins were fully aware of the importance of the statement that it was Jehovah who 'opened the womb of Sara,' and supplemented it with various traditions. It was related that when Isaac was born, the kings of the earth refused to believe such a prodigy concerning even a beauty of ninety years; whereupon the breasts of all their wives were miraculously dried up, and they all had to bring their children to Sara to be suckled.

[37] Fortieth Parascha, fol. 37, col. 1. The solar--or more correctly, so far as Sara is concerned, lunar--aspects of the legend of Abraham, Sara, and Isaac, however important, do not affect the human nature with which they are associated; nor is the special service to which they are pressed in Jewish theology altered by the theory (should it prove true) which derives these personages from Aryan mythology. There seems to be some reason for supposing that Sara is a semiticised form of Saranyú. The two stand in somewhat the same typical position. Saranyú, daughter of Tvashtar ('the fashioner'), was mother of the first human pair, Yama and Yami. Sara is the first mother of those born in a new (covenanted) creation. Each is for a time concealed from mortals; each leaves her husband an illegitimate representative. Saranyú gives her lord Savarná ('substitute'), who by him brings forth Manu,--that is 'Man,' but not the original perfect Man. Sara substitutes Hagar ('the fleeting'), and Ishmael is born, but not within the covenant.

[38] Gen. iii. 14. Zerov. Hummor, fol. 8, col. 3. Parascha Bereschith. It is said that, according to Prov. xxv. 21, if thy enemy hunger thou must feed him; and hence dust must be placed for the serpent when its power over man is weakened by circumcision.

[39] Parascha Bereschith, fol. 12, col. 4. Eisenmenger, Entdeckes Judenthum, ii. 409.

[40] Hist. Arabûm.

[41] Entdeckes Judenthum.

[42] This legend may have been in the mind of the writer of the Book of Revelations when (xii. 14) he describes the Woman who received wings that she might escape the Serpent. Lilith's wings bore her to the Serpent.

[43] Inferno, ix. 56-64.

[44] She was a Lybian Queen beloved by Zeus, whose children were victims of Hera's jealousy. She was daughter of Belus, and it is a notable coincidence, if no more, that in Gen. xxxvi. 'Bela' is mentioned as a king of Edom, the domain of Samaël, who married Lilith.

[45] The martial and hunting customs of the German women, as well as their equality with men, may be traced in the vestiges of their decline. Hexe (witch) is from hag (forest): the priestesses who carried the Broom of Thor were called Hagdissen. Before the seventeenth century the Hexe was called Drud or Trud (red folk, related to the Lightning-god). But the famous female hunters and warriors of Wodan, the Valkyries, were so called also; and the preservation of the epithet (Trud) in the noble name Gertrude is a connecting link between the German Amazons and the political power so long maintained by women in the same country. Their office as priestesses probably marks a step downward from their outdoor equality. By this route, as priestesses of diabolised deities, they became witches; but many folk-legends made these witches still great riders, and the Devil was said to transform and ride them as dapplegrey mares. The chief charge against the witches, that of carnal commerce with devils, is also significant. Like Lilith, women became devils' brides whenever they were not content with sitting at home with the distaff and the child.

[46] Mr. W. B. Scott has painted a beautiful picture of Eve gazing up with longing at a sweet babe in the tree, whose serpent coils beneath she does not see.

[47] 'Records of the Past,' iii. p. 83. See also i. p. 135.

[48] 'Chaldean Genesis,' by George Smith, p. 70.

[49] Copied in 'Chald. Gen.,' p. 91. As to the connection of this design with the legend of Eden, see chap. vii. of this volume.

[50] 'Chaldean Genesis,' pp. 62, 63.

[51] Ib., 97.

[52] 'Records of the Past,' ix. 141.

[53] Anu was the ruler of the highest heaven. Meteors and lightnings are similarly considered in Hebrew poetry as the messengers of the Almighty. (Psalm civ. 4, 'Who maketh his ministers a flaming fire,' quoted in Heb. i. 7.)

[54] Im, the god of the sky, sometimes called Rimmon (the Thunderer). He answers to the Jupiter Tonans of the Latins.

[55] The abyss or ocean where the god Hea dwelt.

[56] The late Mr. G. Smith says that the Chaldean dragon was seven-headed. 'Chaldean Genesis,' p. 100.

[57] 'Records of the Past,' vii. 123.

[58] 'Records of the Past,' x. 127.

[59] See i. pp. 46 and 255. Concerning Ketef see Eisenmenger, ii. p. 435.

[60] Isaiah xiv. It may appear as if in this personification of a fallen star we have entered a different mythological region from that represented by the Assyrian tablets; but it is not so. The demoniac forms of Ishtar, Astarte, are fallen stars also. She appears in Greece as Artemis Astrateia, whose worship Pausanias mentions as coming from the East. Her development is through Asteria (Greek form of Ishtar), in whose myth is hidden much valuable Babylonian lore. Asteria was said to have thrown herself into the sea, and been changed into the island called Asteria, from its having fallen like a star from heaven. Her suicide was to escape from the embraces of Zeus, and her escape from him in form of a quail, as well as her fate, may be instructively compared with the story of Lilith, who flew out of Eden on wings to escape from Adam, and made an effort to drown herself in the Red Sea. The diabolisation of Asteria (the fallen star) was through her daughter Hecate. Hecate was the female Titan who was the most potent ally of the gods. Her rule was supreme under Zeus, and all the gifts valued by mortals were believed to proceed from her; but she was severely judicial, and rigidly withheld all blessings from such as did not deserve them. Thus she was, as the searching eye of Zeus, a star-spy upon earth. Such spies, as we have repeatedly had occasion to mention in this work, are normally developed into devils. From professional detectives they become accusers and instigators. Ishtar of the Babylonians, Asteria of the Greeks, and the Day-star of the Hebrews are male and female forms of the same personification: Hecate with her torch (hekatos, 'far-shooting') and Lucifer ('light-bringer' on the deeds of darkness) are the same in their degradation.

[61] 'Paradise Lost,' i. 40-50.

[62] And foremost rides Prince Rupert, darling of fortune and of war, with his beautiful and thoughtful face of twenty-three, stern and bronzed already, yet beardless and dimpled, his dark and passionate eyes, his long love-locks drooping over costly embroidery, his graceful scarlet cloak, his white-plumed hat, and his tall and stately form. His high-born beauty is preserved to us for ever on the canvas of Vandyck, and as the Italians have named the artist 'Il Pittore Cavalieresco,' so will this subject of his skill remain for ever the ideal of Il Cavaliere Pittoresco. And as he now rides at the head of this brilliant array, his beautiful white dog bounds onward joyously beside him, that quadruped renowned in the pamphlets of the time, whose snowy skin has been stained by many a blood-drop in the desperate forays of his master, but who has thus far escaped so safely that the Puritans believe him a familiar spirit, and try to destroy him 'by poyson and extempore prayer, which yet hurt him no more than the plague plaster did Mr. Pym.' Failing in this, they pronounce the pretty creature to be 'a divell, not a very downright divell, but some Lapland ladye, once by nature a handsome white ladye, now by art a handsome white dogge.'--A Charge with Prince Rupert. Col. Higginson's 'Atlantic Essays.'

[63] Isa. lxiii. 1-6.

[64] Fol. 84, col. 1.

[65] Maarecheth haëlahuth, fol. 257, col. 1.

[66] Gesenius, Heb. Lexic.

[67] Hairiness was a pretty general characteristic of devils; hence, possibly, the epithet 'Old Harry,' i.e., hairy, applied to the Devil. In 'Old Deccan Days,' p. 50, a Rakshasa is described as hairy:--'Her hair hangs around her in a thick black tangle.' But the beard has rarely been accorded to devils.

[68] Buslaef has a beautiful mediæval picture of a devil inciting Cain to hurl stones on his prostrate brother's form.

[69] Forty-one Eastern Tales.

[70] The contest between the agriculturist and the (nomadic) shepherd is expressed in the legend that Cain and Abel divided the world between them, the one taking possession of the movable and the other of the immovable property. Cain said to his brother, 'The earth on which thou standest is mine, then betake thyself to the air;' but Abel replied, 'The garments which thou wearest are mine, take them off.'--Midrash.

[71] Sale's Koran, vii. Al Araf. Iblis, the Mussulman name for the Devil, is probably a corruption of the word diabolus.

[72] Noyes' Translation.

[73] Eisenmenger, Entd. Jud. i. 836.

[74] Job. i. 22, the literal rendering of which is, 'In all this Job sinned not, nor gave God unsalted.' This translation I first heard from Dr. A. P. Peabody, sometime President of Harvard University, from whom I have a note in which he says:--'The word which I have rendered gave is appropriate to a sacrifice. The word I have rendered unsalted means so literally; and is in Job vi. 6 rendered unsavory. It may, and sometimes does, denote folly, by a not unnatural metaphor; but in that sense the word gave--an offertory word--is out of place.' Waltonus (Bib. Polyg.) translates 'nec dedit insulsum Deo;' had he rendered tiphlah by insalsum it would have been exact. The horror with which demons and devils are supposed to regard salt is noticed, i. 288.

[75] Gesenius so understands verse 17 of chap. xiv.

[76] The much misunderstood and mistranslated passage, xix. 25-27 (already quoted), is certainly referable to the wide-spread belief that as against each man there was an Accusing Spirit, so for each there was a Vindicating Spirit. These two stood respectively on the right and left of the balances in which the good and evil actions of each soul were weighed against each other, each trying to make his side as heavy as possible. But as the accusations against him are made by living men, and on earth, Job is not prepared to consider a celestial acquittal beyond the grave as adequate.

[77] 'The Kingdom of Heaven Taken by Prayer.' By William Huntington, S.S. This title is explained to be 'Sinner Saved,' otherwise one might understand the letters to signify a Surviving Syrian.

[78] Num. xxii. 22.

[79] 1 Sam. xxix. 4.

[80] 2 Sam. xix. 22.

[81] 1 Kings ii. 9.

[82] 1 Kings v. 4.

[83] 1 Kings xi. 14.

[84] 1 Kings xi. 25.

[85] Zech. iii.

[86] Cf. Rev. vii. 3.

[87] 'The Sight of Hell,' prepared, as one of a 'Series of Books for Children and Young Persons,' by the Rev. Father Furniss, C.S.S.R., by authority of his Superiors.

[88] M. Anquetil Du Perron's 'Zendavesta et Vie de Zoroastre.'

[89] As given in Mr. Alabaster's 'The Wheel of the Law' (Trübner & Co., 1871). In the Apocryphal Gospels, some of the signs of nature's joy attending the birth of Buddha are reported at the birth of Mary and that of Christ, as the pausing of birds in their flight, &c. Anna is said to have conceived Mary under a tree, as Maia under a tree brought forth Buddha.

[90] 'Mara, or Man (Sanscrit Màra, death, god of love; by some authors translated 'illusion,' as if it came from the Sanscrit Màya), the angels of evil, desire, of love, death, &c. Though King Mara plays the part of our Satan the tempter, he and his host were formerly great givers of alms, which led to their being born in the highest of the Deva heavens, called Paranimit Wasawatti, there to live more than nine thousand million years, surrounded by all the luxuries of sensuality. From this heaven the filthy one, as the Siamese describe him, descends to the earth to tempt and excite to evil.'--Alabaster.

[91] Some say Djemschid, others Guenschesp, a warrior sent to hell for beating the fire.

[92] Leben Jesu, ii. 54. The close resemblance between the trial of Israel in the wilderness and this of Jesus is drawn in his own masterly way.

[93] A passage of the Pesikta (iii. 35) represents a conversation between Jehovah and Satan with reference to Messias which bears a resemblance to the prologue of Job. Satan said: Lord, permit me to tempt Messias and his generation. 'To him the Lord said: You could have no power over him. Satan again said: Permit me because I have the power. God answered: If you persist longer in this, rather would I destroy thee from the world, than that one soul of the generation of Messias should be lost.' Though the rabbin might report the trial declined, the Christian would claim it to have been endured.

[94] In his fresco of the Temptation at the Vatican, Michael Angelo has painted the Devil in the dress of a priest, standing with Jesus on the Temple.

[95] 'Idols and Ideals.' London: Trübner & Co. New York: Henry Holt & Co. In the Essay on Christianity I have given my reasons for this belief.

[96] 'Paradise Regained,' ii.

[97] 'Henry Luria; or, the Little Jewish Convert: being contained in the Memoir of Mrs. S. T. Cohen, relict of the Rev. Dr. A. H. Cohen, late Rabbi of the Synagogue in Richmond, Va.' 1860.

[98] 'Heroes and Hero-worship,' iv.

[99] 'Sartor Resartus.' London: Chapman & Hall, 1869, p. 160.

[100] 'The American Scholar.' An Oration delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society at Cambridge (Massachusetts), August 31, 1837. By Ralph Waldo Emerson.

[101] The relations of this system to those of various countries are stated by Professor King in his work 'The Gnostics and their Remains.'

[102] In the Architectural Museum, Westminster, there is an old picture which possibly represents the hairy Adam.

[103] Josephus; 'Wars of the Jews,' vi. 1.

[104] Those who wish to pursue the subject may consult Plutarch, Philo, Josephus, Diog. Laertius; also Eisenmenger, Wetstein, Elsner, Doughtæi, Lightfoot, Sup. Relig., &c.

[105] See 'Supernatural Religion,' vol. i. ch. 4 and 5, for ample references concerning these superstitions among both Jews and Christians.

[106] 'Saducismus,' p. 53.

[107] 'Eastern Morning News,' quoted in the 'National Reformer,' December 17, 1877.

[108] Much curious information is contained in the work already referred to, 'L'Eau Benite au Dix-neuvième Siècle.' Par Monsignor Gaume, Protonotaire Apostolique. Paris, 1866. It is there stated that water escaped the curse; that salt produces fecundity; that devils driven off temporarily by the cross are effectually dismissed by holy water; that St. Vincent, interrupted by a storm while preaching, dispersed it by throwing holy water at it; and he advises the use of holy water against the latest devices of the devil--spirit-rapping. It must not, however, be supposed that these notions are confined to Catholics. Every element in the disquisition of Monsignor Gaume is represented in the region where his church is most hated. Mr. James Napier, in his recent book on Folklore, shows us the Scotch hastening new-born babes to baptism lest they become 'changelings,' and the true meaning of the rite is illustrated in a reminiscence of his own childhood. He was supposed to be pining under an Evil Eye, and the old woman, or 'skilly,' called in, carefully locked the door, now unlocked by her patient, and proceeded as follows:-- 'A sixpence was borrowed from a neighbour, a good fire was kept burning in the grate, the door was locked, and I was placed upon a chair in front of the fire. The operator, an old woman, took a tablespoon and filled it with water. With the sixpence she then lifted as much salt as it would carry, and both were put into the water in the spoon. The water was then stirred with the forefinger till the salt was dissolved. Then the soles of my feet and the palms of my hands were bathed with this solution thrice, and after these bathings I was made to taste the solution three times. The operator then drew her wet forefinger across my brow--called scoring aboon the breath. The remaining contents of the spoon she then cast right over the fire, into the hinder part of the fire, saying as she did so, 'Guid preserve frae a' skaith.' These were the first words permitted to be spoken during the operation. I was then put in bed, and, in attestation of the charm, recovered. To my knowledge this operation has been performed within these forty years, and probably in many outlying country places it is still practised. The origin of this superstition is probably to be found in ancient fire-worship. The great blazing fire was evidently an important element in the transaction; nor was this a solitary instance in which regard was paid to the fire. I remember being taught that it was unlucky to spit into the fire, some evil being likely shortly after to befall those who did so. Crumbs left upon the table after a meal were carefully gathered and put into the fire. The cuttings from the nails and hair were also put into the fire. These freaks certainly look like survivals of fire-worship.' It may be well here to refer the reader to what has been said in vol. i. on Demons of Fire. The Devil's fear of salt and consequently of water confirmed the perhaps earlier apprehension of all fiery phantoms of that which naturally quenches flame.

[109] We here get a clue to the origin of various strange ceremonies by which men bind themselves to one another. Michelet, in his 'Origines du Droit Français,' writes: 'Boire le sang l'un de l'autre, c'etait pour ainsi dire se faire même chair. Ce symbole si expressif se trouve chez un grand nombre de peuples;' and he gives instances from various ancient races. But, as we here see, this practice is not originally adopted as a symbol (no practices begin as symbols), but is prompted by the belief that a community of nature is thus established, and a community of power over one another.

[110] 'Principles of Sociology,' i. ch. xix. Origen says, that a man eats and drinks with demons when he eats flesh and drinks wine offered to idols. (Contra Cels. viii. 31.)

[111] Dr. James Browne's 'History of the Highlands,' ed. 1855, i. 108.

[112] 'Aurea Legenda.' The story, as intertwined with that of the discovery of the true cross by the Empress Helena, was a fruitful theme for artists. It has been painted in various versions by Angiolo Gaddi in S. Croce at Florence, by Pietro della Francesca at Arezzo, and in S. Croce in Ger. at Rome are frescoes celebrating Helena in a chapel named from her, but into which persons of her sex are admitted only once a year.

[113] To the 'Secular Chronicle,' February 11, 1877.

[114] Psalm lv.

[115] Jer. xxv. 38; xlvi. 16; l. 16.

[116] Isaiah xi. 2, 3.

[117] The more fatal aspect of the dove has tended to invest the pigeon, especially wild pigeons, which in Oldenburg, and many other regions, are supposed to bode calamity and death if they fly round a house.

[118] Sir Nathaniel Wraxall's Memoirs.

[119] Matt. xii. 31.

[120] Mark iii. 28.

[121] I have before me an account by a christian mother of the death of her child, whom she had dedicated to the Lord before his birth, in which she says, 'A full breath issued from his mouth like an etherial flame, a slight quiver of the lip, and all was over.'

[122] 'Serpent poison.' It is substantially the same word as the demonic Samaël. The following is from Colonel Campbell's 'Travels,' ii. p. 130:--'It was still the hot season of the year, and we were to travel through that country over which the horrid wind I have before mentioned sweeps its consuming blasts; it is called by the Turks Samiel, is mentioned by the holy Job under the name of the East wind, and extends its ravages all the way from the extreme end of the Gulf of Cambaya up to Mosul; it carries along with it flakes of fire, like threads of silk; instantly strikes dead those that breathe it, and consumes them inwardly to ashes; the flesh soon becoming black as a coal, and dropping off the bones. Philosophers consider it as a kind of electric fire, proceeding from the sulphurous or nitrous exhalations which are kindled by the agitations of the winds. The only possible means of escape from its fatal effects is to fall flat on the ground, and thereby prevent the drawing it in; to do this, however, it is necessary first to see it, which is not always practicable.'

[123] The 'Sacred Anthology,' p. 425. Nizami uses his fable to illustrate the effect of even an innocent flower on one whom conscience has made a coward.

[124] Nothing is more natural than the Triad: the regions which may be most simply distinguished are the Upper, Middle, and Lower.

[125] Bhàgavàt-Gita.

[126] Gulistan.

[127] Acts ii.

[128] Compare Gen. vi. 3. Jehovah said, 'My breath shall not always abide in man.'

[129] Among the many survivals in civilised countries of these notions may be noticed the belief that, in order to be free from a spell it is necessary to draw blood from the witch above the breath, i.e., mouth and nostrils; to 'score aboon the breath' is a Scottish phrase. This probably came by the 'pagan' route; but it meets its christian kith and kin in the following story which I find in a (MS.) Memorial sent to the House of Lords in 1869 by the Rev. Thomas Berney, Rector of Bracon Ash, Diocese of Norwich:--'I was sent for in haste to privately baptize a child thought to be dying, and belonging to parents who lived 'on the Common' at Hockering. It indeed appeared to be very ill, and its eyes were fixed, and remarkably clouded and dull. Having baptized, I felt moved with a longing desire to be enabled to heal the child; and I prayed very earnestly to the Lord God Almighty to give me faith and strength to enable me to do so. And I put my hands on its head and drew them down on to its arms; and then breathed on its head three times, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. And as I held its arms and looked on it anxiously, its face became exceedingly red and dark, and as the child gradually assumed a natural colour, the eyes became clear again; and then it gently closed its eyes in sleep. And I told the mother not to touch it any more till it awoke; but to carry it up in the cradle as it was. The next morning I found the child perfectly well. She had not touched it, except at four in the morning to feed it, when it seemed dead asleep, and it did not awake till ten o'clock.' This was written by an English Rector, and dated from the Carlton Club! The italics are in the original MS. now before me. The importance that no earthly hand should profanely touch the body while the spirit was at work in it shows how completely systematised is that insanity which consists of making a human mind an arena for the survival of the unfittest.

[130] Luke xxii. 31.

[131] Amos ix. 8, 9.

[132] 1 Cor. v. 5.

[133] 2 Cor. xi. 13.

[134] 1 John iv. 2, 3.

[135] Polycarp, Ep. to Philippians, vii.

[136] 2 Thess. ii.

[137] 2 Peter ii. 15.

[138] John xvii. 12.

[139] 'But,' says Professor King (Gnostics, p. 52), 'a dispassionate examiner will discover that these two zealous Fathers somewhat beg the question in assuming that the Mithraic rites were invented as counterfeits of the Christian Sacraments; the former having really been in existence long before the promulgation of Christianity.' Whatever may have been the incidents in the life of Christ connected with such things, it is certainly true, as Professor King says, that these 'were afterwards invested with the mystic and supernatural virtues, in a later age insisted upon as articles of faith, by succeeding and unscrupulous missionaries, eager to outbid the attractions of more ancient ceremonies of a cognate character.' In the porch of the Church Bocca della Verita at Rome, there is, or was, a fresco of Ceres shelling corn and Bacchus pressing grapes, from them falling the elements of the Eucharist to a table below. This was described to me by a friend, but when I went to see it in 1872, it had just been whitewashed over! I called the attention of Signor Rosa to this shameful proceeding, and he had then some hope that this very interesting relic might be recovered.

[140] Op. iv. 511. Col. Agrip. 1616.

[141] For full details of all these superstitions see Eisenmenger (Entd. Jud. li. Armillus); D'Herbelot (Bib. Orient. Daggiel); Buxtorf (Lexicon, Armillus); Calmet, Antichrist; and on the same word, Smith; also a valuable article in M'Clintock and Strong's Cyc. Bib. Lit. (American).

[142] Deutsch, 'Lit. Remains.' Islam.

[143] Weil's 'Biblical Legends.'

[144] Eisenmenger, ii. 60.

[145] See vol. i. pp. 58 and 358.

[146] 'Zoroastrische Studien,' pp. 138-147. With which comp. Spiegel, Transl. of Avesta, III. xlvii.

[147] 'Studies in the Hist. of the Renaissance.' Macmillan.

[148] 'Chald. Genesis,' by George Smith, p. 84.

[149] This text was engraved by Mrs. Rose Mary Crawshay on a tomb she had erected in honour of her humble neighbour, Mr. Norbury, who sought knowledge for its own sake. Few ancient scriptures could have supplied an inscription so appropriate.

[150] Mr. Baring-Gould, quoting this (from Anastasius Sinaita, Hodêgos, ed. Gretser, Ingolst. 1606, p. 269), attributes this shining face of Seth to his previous character as a Sun-god. ('Old Test. Legends,' i. 84.)

[151] King's 'Gnostics,' p. 53, n.

[152] Tertullian's phrase, 'The Devil is God's Ape,' became popular at one time, and the Ape-devil had frequent representation in art--as, for instance, in Holbein's 'Crucifixion' (1477), now at Augsburg, where a Devil with head of an ape, bat-wings, and flaming red legs is carrying off the soul of the impenitent thief. The same subject is found in the same gallery in an Altdorfer, where the Devil's face is that of a gorilla.

[153] S. Cyp. ap. Muratori, Script. it. i. 295, 545. The Magicians used to call their mirrors after the name of this flower-devil--Fiorone. M. Maury, 'La Magie,' 435 n.

[154] This whole subject is treated, and with ample references, in M. Maury's 'Magie,' p. 41, seq.

[155] 'La Sorcière.'

[156] Dasent's 'Norse Tales,' Introd. ciii.

[157] 'Chips,' ii.

[158] 'Chester Plays,' 1600.

[159] 'Declaration of Popish Impostures,' 1603.

[160] So Shakespere, 'The Devil damn thee black.'

[161] In an account, 1568, we find:--'pay'd for iij li of heare ijs vjd.'

[162] The Directions for the 'Castle of Good Perseverance,' say: '& he þt schal pley belyal, loke þt he have guñe powdr breñng in pypysih's hands & i h's ers & i h's ars whãne he gothe to batayle.'

[163] This notion was widespread. I have seen an ancient Russian picture in which the Devil is dancing before a priest who has become drowsy over his prayer-book. There was once a Moslem controversy as to whether it was fair for pilgrims to keep themselves awake for their prayers by chewing coffee-berries.

[164] 'Liber Revelationum de Insidiis et Versutiis Dæmonum adversus Homines.' See Reville's Review of Roskoff, 'The Devil,' p. 38.

[165] See M. Maury's 'Magie,' p. 48.

[166] The history has been well related by a little work by Dr. Albert Réville: 'Apollonius of Tyana, the Pagan Christ.' Chatto & Windus.

[167] Sinistrari names Luther as one of eleven persons whom he enumerates as having been begotten by Incubi, 'Enfin, comme l'ecrit Codens, cité par Maluenda, ce damné Hérésiarque, qui a nom Martin Luther.'--'Démonialité,' 30.

[168] Glanvil's 'Saducismus.'

[169] King Lear, iii. 4. Asmodeus and Mohammed are, no doubt, corrupted in these names, which are given as those of devils in Harsenet's 'Declaration of Popish Impostures.'

[170] 'A Discourse of Witchcraft. As it was acted in the Family of Mr. Edward Fairfax, of Fuystone, in the county of York, in the year 1621. Sibi parat malum, qui alteri parat.'

[171] W. F. Poole, Librarian of Chicago, to whom I am indebted for a copy of Governor Thomas Hutchinson's account of 'The Witchcraft Delusion of 1692,' with his valuable notes on the same.

[172] The delicacy with which these animals are alluded to rather than directly named indicates that they had not lost their formidable character in Elfdale so far as to be spoken of rashly.

[173] Glanvil, 'Saducismus Triumphatus,' p. 170.

[174] Porphyry, ap. Euseb. v. 12. The formula not preserved by Eusebius is supposed by M. Maury ('Magie,' 56) to be that contained in the 'Philosophumena,' attributed to Origen:--'Come, infernal, terrestrial, and celestial Bombo! goddess of highways, of cross-roads, thou who bearest the light, who travellest the night, enemy of the day, friend and companion of darkness; thou rejoicing in the baying of dogs and in shed blood, who wanderest amid shadows and over tombs; thou who desirest blood and bearest terrors to mortals,--Gorgo, Mormo, moon of a thousand forms, aid with a propitious eye our sacrifices!'

[175] 'The Devil,' &c., p. 51.

[176] Scheible's 'Kloster,' 5, 116. Zauberbücher.

[177] Bayard Taylor's 'Faust,' note 45. See also his Appendix I. for an excellent condensation of the Faust legend from the best German sources.

[178] Tertull. ad Marcion, iii. 18. S. Ignatii Episc. et Martyr ad Phil. Ep. viii. 'The Prince of this world rejoices when any one denies the cross, for he knows the confession of the cross to be his ruin.'

[179] See his 'Acta,' by Simeon Metaphrastus.

[180] I have been much struck by the resemblance between the dumpy monkish dwarf, in the old wall-picture of Auerbach's Cellar, meant for Mephistopheles, and the portrait of Asmodeus in the early editions of 'Le Diable Boiteux.' But, as devils went in those days, they are good-looking enough.

[181] Shelley's Translation.

[182] Bayard Taylor's Translation. Scene iv.

[183] See Lavater's Physiognomy, Plates xix. and xx., in which some artist has shown what variations can be made to order on an intellectual and benevolent face.

[184] 'Der deutsche Volksaberglaube der Gegenwart.' Von Dr. Adolf Wuttke, Prof. der Theol. in Halle. Berlin: Verlag von Wiegand & Grieben. 1869.

[185] 'Histoire de France et des Choses Mémorables,' &c.

[186] The universal myth of Sleepers,--christianised in the myth of St. John, and of the Seven whose slumber is traceable as far as Tours,--had a direct pagan development in Jami, Barbarossa, Arthur, and their many variants. It is the legend of the Castle of Sewingshields in Northumberland, that King Arthur, his queen and court, remain there in a subterranean hall, entranced, until some one should first blow a bugle-horn near the entrance hall, and then with 'the sword of the stone' cut a garter placed there beside it. But none had ever heard where the entrance to this enchanted hall was, till a farmer, fifty years since, was sitting knitting on the ruins of the castle, and his clew fell and ran downwards through briars into a deep subterranean passage. He cleared the portal of its weeds and rubbish, and entering a vaulted passage, followed the clew. The floor was infested with toads and lizards; and bats flitted fearfully around him. At length his sinking courage was strengthened by a dim, distant light, which, as he advanced, grew gradually brighter, till all at once he entered a vast and vaulted hall, in the centre of which a fire, without fuel, from a broad crevice in the floor, blazed with a high and lambent flame, that showed all the carved walls and fretted roof, and the monarch and his queen and court reposing around in a theatre of thrones and costly couches. On the floor, beyond the fire, lay the faithful and deep-toned pack of thirty couple of hounds; and on a table before it the spell-dissolving horn, sword, and garter. The shepherd firmly grasped the sword, and as he drew it from its rusty scabbard the eyes of the monarch and his courtiers began to open, and they rose till they sat upright. He cut the garter, and as the sword was slowly sheathed the spell assumed its ancient power, and they all gradually sank to rest; but not before the monarch had lifted up his eyes and hands and exclaimed--

O woe betide that evil day On which this witless wight was born, Who drew the sword--the garter cut, But never blew the bugle horn.

Terror brought on loss of memory, and the shepherd was unable to give any correct account of his adventure, or to find again the entrance to the enchanted hall.--Hodgson's 'Northumberland.'

[187] This great discussion between the animals and sages is given in 'The Sacred Anthology' (London: Trübner & Co. New York: Henry Holt & Co.). It is a very ancient story, and was probably written down at the beginning of the christian era.

[188] It is a strange proof of the ignorance concerning Hindu religion that Jugernath, raised in a sense for reprobation of cruelty to man and beast, should have been made by a missionary myth a Western proverb for human sacrifices!

[189] St. Olaf = Stooley = Tooley.

[190] High bloweth Heimdall His horn aloft; Odin consulteth Mimir's head; The old ash yet standing Yggdrasill To its summit is shaken, And loose breaks the giant.--Voluspa.

[191] 'Rigveda,' x. 99.

[192] 'Zoolog. Myth.,' ii. 8, 10, &c.

[193] 'The Mahawanso.' Translated by the Hon. George Turnour, Ceylon, 1836, p. 69.

[194] It was an ancient custom to offer a stag on the high altar of Durham Abbey, the sacrifice being accompanied with winding of horns, on Holy Rood Day, which suggests a form of propitiating the Wild Huntsman in the hunting season. On the Cheviot Hills there is a chasm called Hen Hole, 'in which there is frequently seen a snow egg at Midsummer, and it is related that a party of hunters, while chasing a roe, were beguiled into it by fairies, and could never again find their way out.'--Richardson's 'Borderer's Table-Book,' vi 400. The Bridled Devil of Durham Cathedral may be an allusion to the Wild Huntsman.

[195] In the pre-petrified era of Theology this hope appears to have visited the minds of some, Origen for instance. But by many centuries of utilisation the Devil became so essential to the throne of Christianity that theologians were more ready to spare God from their system than Satan. 'Even the clever Madame de Staël,' said Goethe, 'was greatly scandalised that I kept the Devil in such good-humour. In the presence of God the Father, she insisted upon it, he ought to be more grim and spiteful. What will she say if she sees him promoted a step higher,--nay, perhaps, meets him in heaven?' Though, in another conversation with Falk, Goethe intimates that he had written a passage 'where the Devil himself receives grace and mercy from God,' the artistic theory of his poem could permit no nearer approach to this than those closing lines (Faust, II.) in which Mephistopheles reproaches the 'case-hardened Devil' and himself for their mismanagement. To the isolated, the not yet humanised, intellect sensuality is evil when senseless, and its hell is folly.

[196] 'Demonialite,' 60-62, &c. We may hope that this learned man, during his tenure of office under the Inquisition, had some mercy for the poor devils dragged before that tribunal.

[197] 'Reverberations.' By W. M. W. Call, M.A., Cambridge. Second Edition. Trübner & Co., 1876.

[198] The Holy Grail was believed to have been fashioned from the largest of all diamonds, lost from the crown of Satan as he fell from Heaven. Guarded by angels until used at the Last Supper, it was ultimately secured by Arthur's knight, Percival, and--such is the irony of mythology--indirectly by the aid of Satan's own son, Merlin!

[199] See Mr. J. A. Froude's article in 'Fraser's Magazine,' Feb. 1878, 'Origen and Celsus.'

[200] Mr. W. W. Lloyd's 'Age of Pericles,' vol. ii. p. 202.

[201] Journal of the Ceylon Branch of the R. A. S., 1865-6: Art. on 'Demonology and Witchcraft in Ceylon,' by Dundris de Silva Gooneratne Modliar.

[202] Euripides, 'Medea,' 574.

[203] 'Paradise Lost,' x. 860.

[204] Herodotus, 'Clio,' 7-14, 91.

[205] 'Expression of the Emotions.' By Charles Darwin. London: Murray, 1872.