CHAPTER V.
Instances of Satan’s power.—Of witchcraft, what it is.—Satan’s power argued from thence.—Of wonders.—Whether Satan can do miracles?—An account of what he can do that way.—His power argued from apparitions and possessions.
I shall add, in the fifth place, some particular instances of his power, in which I shall insist upon these four—witchcraft, wonders, apparitions, and possessions.
1. First, Witchcraft affords a very great discovery of Satan’s power. But because some give such interpretations of witchcraft, as, if true, would wholly take away the force of this instance, I shall first endeavour to establish a true notion of witchcraft; and secondly, from thence argue Satan’s power.
(1.) First, Though the being of witches is not directly denied, because the authority of Scripture—Exod. xxii. 18; Deut. xviii. 10, &c.—hath determined beyond controversy that such there are; yet some will allow no other interpretation of the word,[102] than a skill and practice in the art of poisoning, because the Septuagint doth interpret the Hebrew word, מכשפה, by φάρμακον, veneficam; which apprehension they strengthen by the authority of Josephus,[103] who giveth this account of the law, ‘Let none of the children of Israel use any deadly poison, or any drug wherewith he may do hurt,’ &c. It is easy to observe that this conceit ariseth from a great inobservancy of the reason of the application of these words, φάρμακος and veneficus, to witchcraft, in Greek and Latin authors.
Witchcrafts were supposed to be helped forward by the strength of several herbs, and these, by incantations and other ceremonies at their gathering, imagined to attain a poisonous and evil quality or efficacy for such effects as were intended to be produced by them, as appears by Ovid, Virgil, and other authors.[104] Hence was it that the word φάρμακος became applicable to any sort of witchcraft. To this may be added, that such persons were resorted to for help against diseases, [vide Leigh. Crit. Sac. in Voc.] As also that they used unguents for transportations. Hence Godwin [Jew. Antiq., lib. iv. cap. 10] renders φαρμάκους by unguentarios. Diascorides [Cap. de Rhamno] hath an expression to this purpose, ‘that the branch of that tree, being placed before the doors, doth drive away τῶν φαρμάκων κακουργίας, witchcrafts.’ It were ridiculous to say it drives away poisonings; which is a sufficient evidence that the Grecians used that word to signify another kind of witchcraft than that which this mistake would establish. Besides this, the Scripture doth afford two strong arguments against this interpretation of witchcraft.
[1.] That this word is ranked with others, as being of the same alliance, which will carry the apprehensions of any considerate man to effects done by the help of Satan, in an unusual way, as Deut. xviii. 10, ‘There shall not be found among you any that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire’—this is not the consuming of their children to Moloch, but by way of lustration, a mock baptism, a piece of witchcraft, to preserve from violent death—‘or that useth divination, an observer of times, or an enchanter, or a witch,’ &c.[105] The very neighbourhood of the witch will tell us that this witch must be a diviner, divination being the general term, comprehending the seven particulars following.[106] It would be a harsh straining to put in the poisoner, in the sense of our opposites, among the diviners. Yet the second argument is more cogent, which is this: That among those whom Pharaoh called together to encounter with Moses, Exod. vii. 11, we find witches or sorcerers expressed by the same word, מכשפים, which is used in Exod. xxii. and Deut. xviii. What can more certainly fix the interpretation of the word than this place, where the end of Pharaoh’s calling them together was, not to poison Moses and Aaron, but by enchantment to outvie them in point of miracles? which will shew that witchcraft is not poisoning, but the doing of strange acts by the aid of Satan. Neither was this the act of one man—who might possibly, together with that present age, be under a mistake concerning witches, though it be a thing not to be supposed—but long after him, Nebuchadnezzar, in Dan. ii. 4, being astonished with his dreams, calls for the sorcerers or witches, and magicians, to give him the interpretation; which had been a matter very improper for them, if their skill had lain only in mixing poisons.[107]
When we have thus silenced this imagination, we have yet another to encounter with, and that is, Of those that think these witches, of which the fore-cited texts do speak, are but mere cheats, and by some tricks of delusion and legerdemain pretend they can do things which indeed they cannot do at all; and yet finding death threatened to such, which, in a business of mere juggling, would seem too great a severity, they have framed this answer to it,[108] that the death is threatened, not for juggling, but for their presumptuous and blasphemous undertaking to do things that belong to a divine power, and for taking his name in vain. Or, as others are pleased to say,[109] though they have no real power, they are justly punished for the belief they have, that they can do such mischief, joined with their purpose to do it, if they can.
In answer to this apprehension, I shall not much insist upon these reasons, which yet are sufficiently weak—the latter accusing God’s laws of unreasonable severity, and the former accusing them of unnecessary redundancy, seeing enough in other places is provided against blasphemers[110]—but shall offer a consideration or two, which I judge will be of force to rectify the mistake.
[1.] First, Though it cannot be denied but that a great many cheats there have been in all ages, by which men have endeavoured to raise the repute and esteem of their own skill and excellencies, or for other base ends; yet, from hence to conclude that all these things that have been done under the name of witchcraft were such, must be an unsufferable piece of insolence; not only denying that credit which all sober men owe to history, to the constant belief of all ages, to the faithfulness and wisdom of judges, jurors, witnesses, laws, and sanctions, but also dangerously overthrowing all our senses; so that at this rate we may well question whether we really eat, drink, move, sleep, and anything else that we do. This reason is urged by grave and serious men.[111]
[2.] Secondly, It cannot be imagined that such things are merely delusory, where the voluntary confessions of so many have accused themselves and others, not of thinking or juggling, but of really acting and doing such things—with such circumstances as have particularised time, place, thing, and manner.
[3.] Thirdly, The real effects done by the power of witchcraft shew it not to be delusion. Such are the transportation of persons many miles from their habitations, and leaving them there; their telling things done in remote places; raising of storms and tempests; vomiting of pins, needles, stones, cloth, leather, and such like; and these, some of them, attested by sober and intelligent persons who were eye-witnesses. Large accounts you have of these in Bodinus, Sprengerius, and several others that have borrowed these relations from them.[112]
The notion of poisonings, or delusory jugglings, being below what the Scripture intends to set forth as witchcraft, it is evident that witchcraft is a power of doing great things by the aid of the devil; by which our way is open to improve this instance, to demonstrate— which was the second thing promised—that Satan’s power must be great. For,
[1.] First, It is acknowledged that a great part of those things that are done in this matter, as concurrent with, or helpful toward the promoting of such acts, are Satan’s proper works—as the troubling of the air, raising storms, apparitions, various shapes and appearances, transportations from place to place, and a great many more things of wonder and amazement, all which exceed human power.[113]
[2.] Secondly, Many things of wonder done by such persons, to which some suppose the secret powers of herbs or things contribute their natural aids or concurrence, are evidences of Satan’s deep knowledge of and insight into natural causes. Of this nature is that ointment with which witches are said to besmear themselves in order to their transportation; the power and efficacy whereof is by some imagined to consist in this, that it keeps the body tenantable and in a fit condition to receive the soul by re-entry after such separations, as, by all circumstances are concluded, have been really made in pursuit of those visionary perambulations and transactions; which things, if they be so—as they are not improbable—witches have them from Satan’s discovery, and they are to be ascribed to his power.[114]
[3.] Thirdly, Those actions that are most properly the witch’s own actions, and in which the power of hurting doth, as some suppose, reside, are notwithstanding either awakened or influenced by Satan; so though we grant, what some would have, that the power of hurting is a natural power, and a venomous magnetism of the witch, and that her imagination, by her eye darts those malignant beams which produce real hurts upon men—after the manner of the imagination’s force upon a child in the womb, which hath, as by daily experience and history is confirmed, produced marks, impressions, deformities, and wounds—and that Satan doth but cheat the witch into a belief of his aid in that matter; that with a greater advantage he may make use of her power, without which he could do nothing; yet even this speaks his ability, in that at least he doth awaken and raise up that magical force which otherwise would be asleep, and so puts the sword into their hand. Yet some attribute far more to him—to wit, the infusion of a poisonous ferment—by that action of sucking the witch in some part of the body—by which not only her imagination might be heightened by poisonous streams breathed in, which might infect blood and spirits with a noxious tincture.[115]
2. The second grand instance of his power I shall produce from those actions of wonder and astonishment which he sometime performs, which indeed have been so great that they have occasioned that question—
Whether Satan can do miracles?
To this we answer—
(1.) That God alone can work miracles, a miracle being a real act, done visibly, and above the power of nature. Such works some have ranked into three heads:[116] [1.] Such as created power cannot produce; as to make the sun stand still or go backward. [2.] Such as are in themselves produceable by nature,[117] but not in such an order; as to make the dead to live, and those that were born blind to see, which is strongly argued, John ix. 32, to be above human power; and, John x. 21, to be above the power of devils. [3.] Such as are the usual works of nature, yet produced, above the principles and helps of nature, as to cure a disease by a word or touch.
Things that are thus truly and properly miraculous are peculiarly works of God; neither can it be imagined, that since he hath been pleased to justify his commands, ways, and messages, by such mighty acts—2 Cor. xii. 12; Heb. ii. 4; John x. 38—and also hath been put to it, to justify himself and his sole supreme being and godhead from false competitors—Ps. lxxxvi. 10, and lxxii. 18—by his miraculous works, it cannot be imagined, I say, that he would permit any created being, much less Satan, to do such things.
(2.) Secondly, Though Satan cannot do things miraculous, yet he can do things wonderful and amazing—mira non miracula. And in this point lies the danger of delusion, as Christ foretells: Mat. xxiv. 24, ‘False Christs shall arise, and shew great signs and wonders.’ In 2 Thes. ii. 4, the apostle tells us, ‘The coming of antichrist shall be with all power, and signs, and wonders’—that is, as some interpret,[118] with the power of signs and wonders; which, however they be lying, both in reference to the design they drive at—which is to propagate errors—and also in their own nature, being truly such, in respect of their form, false as miracles, being indeed no such matter, but juggling cheats; yet, notwithstanding, there is no small cunning and working of Satan in them, insomuch that the uncautious and injudicious are ‘deceived by those wonders that he hath power to do,’ Rev. xiii. 13. In this matter, though we are not able to give a particular account of these underground actions, yet thus much we may say—
[1.] First, That in many cases his great acts, that pass for miracles, are no more but deceptions of sense. Naturalists have shewn several feats and knacks of this kind. Jo. Bap. Porta[119] hath a great many ways of such deceptions, by lamps and the several compositions of oils, by which not only the colours of things are changed, but men appear without heads, or with the heads of horses, &c. The like deceptions are wrought by glasses of various figures and shapes. If art can do such things, much more can Satan.
[2.] Secondly, He can mightily work upon the fancy and imagination; by which means men are abused into a belief of things that are not; as in dreams, the fancy presents things which are really imagined to be done and said, whenas they are visions of the night, which vanish when the man is awake; or as in melancholy persons, the fancy of men doth so strongly impose upon them, that they believe strange absurd things of themselves—that they have horns on their head, that they are made of glass, that they are dead, and what not. If fancy, both asleep and awake, may thus abuse men into an apprehension of impossible things, and that with confidence, no wonder if Satan, whose power reacheth thus far, as was before proved, doth take this advantage for the amusing of men with strange things. Nebuchadnezzar his judgment, Dan. iv. 25, whereby he was ‘driven from men, and ate grass as oxen,’ was not a metamorphosis, or real change into an ox. This all expositors reject as too hard. Neither seems it to be only his extreme necessity and low estate, whereby he seemed to be little better than a beast, though Calvin favour this interpretation;[120] but by that expression, ver. 25, ‘then my understanding came to me,’ it seems evident, as most commentators think, that his understanding was so changed in that punishment that he imagined himself to be a beast, and behaved himself accordingly, by eating grass, and lying in the open fields. There are several stories to this purpose of strange transformations, as the bodies of men into asses, and other beasts, which Augustine thinks to be nothing else but the devil’s power upon the fancy.[121]
[3.] Thirdly, There are wonderful secrets in nature, which if cunningly used and applied to fit things and times, must needs amaze vulgar heads; and though some of these are known to philosophers and scholars, yet are there many secret things locked from the wisest men, whose powers and natures because they know not, they may also be deluded by them. Augustine[122] reckons up many instances, as the loadstone, the stone pyrites, selenites, the fountain of Epirus, that can kindle a torch, and many more; and determines that many strange things are done by the application of these natural powers, either by the wit of man or diabolical art. To this purpose he gives an account of an unextinguishable lamp, Λύχνος ἄσβεστος, in a temple of Venus, which allured men to worship there, as to an unquestionable deity, when in truth the thing was but an ingenious composition from the stone asbeston, of which Pliny makes mention, that being kindled, it will not be quenched with water.[123] Of this nature were those lamps found in several vaults accompanying the ashes of the dead, reserved there in urns, both in England and elsewhere.[124] If men by such helps find such easy ways to delude men, what exactness of workmanship and seeming wonders may be expected from Satan upon such advantages!
[4.] Fourthly, Many of his wonders may challenge a higher rise. Satan knows the secret ways of nature’s operations, and the ways of accelerating or retarding those works; so that he cannot only do what nature can do, by a due application of active to passive principles,[125] and the help of those seminal powers that are in things, but he may be supposed to perform them in a quicker and more expeditious manner. Thus worms, flies, and serpents, that are bred of putrefaction, Satan may speedily produce; and who can tell how far this help may reach in his works of wonders?
[5.] Fifthly, The secret way of Satan’s movings and actings is no small matter in these affairs. How many things do common jugglers by the swift motions of their hands, that seem incredible! Thus they make the bystanders believe they change the substances, natures, and forms of things, when they only, by a speedy conveyance, take these things away, and put others in their room. They that shall consider Satan as a spirit, subtle, imperceptible, quick of motion, &c., will easily believe him to be more accomplished for such conveyances than all the men in the world.
Having now seen the way of his wonders, let us next consider the advantage he hath by such actions. If we look upon Simon Magus, Acts viii. 10, 11, we find that he by these ways had a general influence upon the people, ‘To him they all gave heed, from the least to the greatest;’ and that his actions were reckoned no less than miraculous, as done by ‘the mighty power of God.’ If we go from hence to the magicians of Pharaoh, Exod. vii. 11, it is said, ‘They did so with their enchantments,’ which, howsoever the matter was, prevailed so with Pharaoh and the court, that they saw no difference betwixt the wonders done by Moses and them, save that, it may be, they thought Moses the more skilful magician. But besides this, if we consider what they did, it will argue much for his power, if we can imagine, as some do,[126] that they turned their rods into real serpents; the power is evident: and there is this that favours that opinion; it is said they could not make lice, which seems to imply they really did the other things, and it had been as easy to delude the senses in the matter of lice as in the rods, if it had been no more than a delusion. Neither are some awanting to give a reason of such a power—viz., serpents, lice, &c., being the offspring of putrefaction; by his dexterous application of the seminal principles of things, he might quickly produce them. If we go lower, and take up with the opinion of those that think that they were neither mere delusions, nor yet true serpents; but real bodies like serpents, though without life, this will argue a very great power.[127] Or if we suppose, as some do,[128] that Satan took away the rods, and secretly conveyed serpents in their stead, or—which is the lowest apprehension we can have—that Pharaoh’s sight was deceived, the matter is still far from being contemptible, forasmuch as we see the spectators were not able to discern the cheat.
3. Thirdly, The next instance produceable for evidencing his power is that of apparitions. It cannot be denied but that the fancy of melancholic or timorous persons is fruitful enough to create a thousand bugbears; and also that the villainy of some persons hath been designedly employed to deceive people with mock apparitions—of which abundance of instances might be given from the knavery of the papists, discovered to the world beyond contradiction; but all this will not conclude that there are no real appearances of spirit or devils. Such sad effects in all ages there have been of these things, that most men will take it for an undeniable truth.
Instead of others, let the apparition at Endor to Saul come to examination. Some indeed[129] will have us believe that all that was but a subtle cheat managed by that old woman; and that neither Samuel nor the devil did appear, but that the woman, in another room by herself, or with a confederate, gave the answer to Saul. But whosoever shall read that story, and shall consider Saul’s bowing and discourse, and the answers given, must acknowledge that Saul thought at least he saw and spake with Samuel; and indeed the whole transaction is such, that such a cheat cannot be supposed.
Satisfying ourselves, then, that there was an apparition, we must next inquire whether it was true Samuel or Satan. It cannot be denied but that many judge it was true Samuel, but their reasons are weak.[130]
[1.] That proof from Ecclesiasticus xlvi. 23, is not canonical with us.
[2.] That he was called Samuel, is of no force. Scripture often gives names of things according to their appearances.
[3.] That things future were foretold, was but from conjecture; in which Satan yet, all things considered, had good ground for his guessing.
[4.] That the name Jehovah is oft repeated, signifies nothing. The devil is not so scarce of words. ‘Jesus I know,’ saith that spirit in the Acts.
[5.] That he reproved sin in Saul, is no more than what the devil doth daily to afflicted consciences in order to despair.
I must go then with those that believe this was Satan in Samuel’s likeness.
[1.] Because God refused to answer Saul by prophets or Urim; and it is too harsh to think he would send Samuel from the dead, and so answer him in an extraordinary way.
[2.] This, if it had been Samuel, would have given too much countenance to witchcraft, contrary to that check to Ahaziah, 2 Kings i. 3, ‘Is it not because there is not a God in Israel, that ye go to inquire of Baal-zebub?’
[3.] The prediction of Saul’s death, though true for substance, yet failed as to the exactness of time, for the battle was not fought the next day.
[4.] The acknowledgment of the witch’s power, ‘Why hast thou disquieted me?’ shews it could not be true Samuel, the power of witchcraft not being able to reach souls at rest with God.
[5.] That expression of ‘gods ascending out of the earth,’ is evidently suspicious.
The reality of apparitions being thus established, Satan’s power will be easily evinced from it. To say nothing of the bodies in which spirits appear, the haunting of places and persons, and the other effects done by such appearances, speak abundantly for it.
4. Fourthly, The last instance is of possessions, the reality of which can no way be questioned, because the New Testament affords so much for it. I shall only note some things as concerning this head. As,
(1.) First, The multitudes of men possessed. Scarce was there anything in which Christ had more opportunities to shew his authority than in casting out of Satan. Such objects of compassion he met with in every place.
(2.) Secondly, The multitudes of spirits in one person is a consideration not to be passed by.
(3.) Thirdly, These persons were often strongly acted, sometime with fierceness and rage, Mat. viii. 28; some living without clothes and without house, Luke viii. 27; some by an incredible strength breaking chains and fetters, Mark v. 3.
(4.) Fourthly, Sometime the possessed were sadly vexed and afflicted, cast into the fire and water, &c.
(5.) Fifthly, Some were strangely influenced. We read of one, Acts xvi. 16, that had a spirit of divination, and told many things to come, which we may suppose frequently came to pass, else she could have brought ‘no gain to her master by soothsaying.’ Another we hear of whose possession was with a lunacy, and had fits at certain times and seasons. The possessed person with whom Mr Rothwell discoursed, within the memory of some living, could play the critic in the Hebrew language.[131]
(6.) Sixthly, In some the possession was so strong, and so firmly seated, that ordinary means and ways could not dispossess them: ‘This kind comes not out but by prayer and fasting,’ Mat. xvii. 21; which shews that all possession was not of one kind and manner, nor alike liable to ejection.
(7.) Seventhly, To all these may be added obsessions: where the devil afflicts the bodies of men, disquiets them, haunts them, or strikes in with their melancholy temper, and so annoys by hideous and black representations. Thus was Saul vexed by ‘an evil spirit from the Lord,’ which as most conceive was the devil working in his melancholy humour. That the devil should take possession of the bodies of men, and thus act, drive, trouble, and distress them, so distort, distend, and rack their members; so seat himself in their tongues and minds that a man cannot command his own faculties and powers, but seems to be rather changed into the nature of a devil than to retain anything of a man, this shews a power in him to be trembled at.
Satan’s power being thus explained and proved, I shall next speak something of his cruelty.