THE FAUST LEGENDS.
About the middle of the thirteenth century began to spread the notion of formal written agreements between the Fiend and men who were to be his exclusive property after a certain time, during which he was to help them to all earthly good. This, curious to say, came with Christianity from the East. The first instance was that of Theophilus, vicedominus of the Bishop of Adana, a city of Cilicia, in the sixth century, whose fall and conversion form the original of all the Faust legends. The story of Theophilus may be found in various works, among them Ennemoser’s Universal History of Magic, which was translated by William Howitt.