The circumstances of two pistols terminating the scenes with which the elf had disturbed the good curé, made him believe that this tormenting imp was no other than a certain bad parishioner, whom the curé had been obliged to send away from his parish, and who to revenge himself had done all that we have related. If that be the case, he had rendered himself invisible, or he had had credit enough to send in his stead a familiar genius who puzzled the curé for some weeks; for, if he were not bodily in this house, what had he to fear from any pistol shot which might have been fired at him? And if he was there bodily, how could he render himself invisible?
I have been told several times that a monk of the Cistercian order had a familiar genius who attended upon him, arranged his chamber, and prepared everything ready for him when he was coming back from the country. They were so accustomed to this, that they expected him home by these signs, and he always arrived. It is affirmed of another monk of the same order that he had a familiar spirit, who warned him, not only of what passed in the house, but also of what happened out of it; and one day he was awakened three times, and warned that some monks were quarreling, and were ready to come to blows; he ran to the spot, and put an end to the dispute.
St. Sulpicius Severus[[284]] relates that St. Martin often had conversations with the Holy Virgin, and other saints, and even with the demons and false gods of paganism; he talked with them, and learned from them many secret things. One day, when a council was being held at Nîmes, where he had not thought proper to be present, but the decisions of which he desired to know, being in a boat with St. Sulpicius, but apart from others, as usual with him, an angel appeared, and informed him what had passed in this assembly of bishops. Inquiry was made as to the day and hour when the council was held, and it was found to be at the same hour at which the angel had appeared to Martin.
We have been told several times that a young ecclesiastic, in a seminary at Paris, had a genius who waited upon him, and arranged his room and his clothes. One day, when the superior was passing by the chamber of the seminarist, he heard him talking with some one; he entered, and asked who he was conversing with. The youth affirmed that there was no one in his room, and, in fact, the superior could neither see nor discover any one there. Nevertheless, as he had heard their conversation, the young man owned that for some years he had been attended by a familiar genius, who rendered him every service that a domestic could have done, and had promised him great advantages in the ecclesiastical profession. The superior pressed him to give some proofs of what he said. He ordered the genius to set a chair for the superior; the genius obeyed. Information of this was sent to the archbishop, who did not think proper to give it publicity. The young clerk was sent away, and this singular adventure was buried in silence.
Bodin[[285]] speaks of a person of his acquaintance who was still living at the time he wrote, which was in 1588. This person had a familiar who from the age of thirty-seven had given him good advice respecting his conduct, sometimes to correct his faults, sometimes to make him practice virtue, or to assist him; resolving the difficulties which he might find in reading holy books, or giving him good counsel upon his own affairs. He usually rapped at his door at three or four o'clock in the morning to awaken him; and as that person mistrusted all these things, fearing that it might be an evil angel, the spirit showed himself in broad day, striking gently on a glass bowl, and then upon a bench. When he desired to do anything good and useful, the spirit touched his right ear; but if it was anything wrong and dangerous, he touched his left ear; so that from that time nothing occurred to him of which he was not warned beforehand. Sometimes he heard his voice; and one day, when he found his life in imminent danger, he saw his genius, under the form of a child of extraordinary beauty, who saved him from it.
William, Bishop of Paris,[[286]] says that he knew a rope-dancer who had a familiar spirit which played and joked with him, and prevented him from sleeping, throwing something against the wall, dragging off the bed-clothes, or pulling him about when he was in bed. We know by the account of a very sensible person that it has happened to him in the open country, and in the day time, to feel his cloak and boots pulled at, and his hat thrown down; then he heard the bursts of laughter and the voice of a person deceased and well known to him, who seemed to rejoice at it.
The discovery of things hidden or unknown, which is made in dreams, or otherwise, can hardly be ascribed to anything but to familiar spirits. A man who did not know a word of Greek came to M. de Saumaise, senior, a counselor of the Parliament of Dijon, and showed him these words, which he had heard in the night, as he slept, and which he wrote down in French characters on awaking: "Apithi ouc osphraine tén sén apsychian." He asked him what that meant. M. de Saumaise told him it meant, "Save yourself; do you not perceive the death with which you are threatened?" Upon this hint, the man removed, and left his house, which fell down the following night.[[287]]
The same story is related, with a little difference, by another author, who says that the circumstance happened at Paris;[[288]] that the genius spoke in Syriac, and that M. de Saumaise being consulted, replied, "Go out of your house, for it will fall in ruins to-day, at nine o'clock in the evening." It is but too much the custom in reciting stories of this kind to add a few circumstances by way of embellishment.
Gassendi, in the Life of M. Peiresch, relates that M. Peiresch, going one day to Nismes, with one of his friends, named M. Rainier, the latter, having heard Peiresch talking in his sleep in the night, waked him, and asked him what he said. Peiresch answered him, "I dreamed that, being at Nismes, a jeweler had offered me a medal of Julius Cæsar, for which he asked four crowns, and as I was going to count him down his money, you waked me, to my great regret." They arrived at Nismes, and going about the town, Peiresch recognized the goldsmith whom he had seen in his dream; and on his asking him if he had nothing curious, the goldsmith told him he had a gold medal, or coin, of Julius Cæsar. Peiresch asked him how much he esteemed it worth; he replied, four crowns. Peiresch paid them, and was delighted to see his dream so happily accomplished.
Here is a dream much more singular than the preceding, although a little in the same style.[[289]] A learned man of Dijon, after having wearied himself all day with an important passage in a Greek poet, without being able to comprehend it at all, went to bed thinking of this difficulty. During his sleep, his genius transported him in spirit to Stockholm, introduced him into the palace of Queen Christina, conducted him into the library, and showed him a small volume, which was precisely what he sought. He opened it, read in it ten or twelve Greek verses, which absolutely cleared up the difficulty which had so long beset him; he awoke, and wrote down the verses he had seen at Stockholm. On the morrow, he wrote to M. Descartes, who was then in Sweden, and begged of him to look in such a place, and in such a division of the library, if the book, of which he sent him the description, were there, and if the Greek verses which he sent him were to be read in it.