Bernardo di Como draws the nice distinction that it is not heretical to invoke the devil to obtain the illicit love of a woman, for the function of Satan is that of a tempter.—Bernardi Comens. Lucerna Inquisit. s.v. Dæmones, No. 2.
In 1471 the arts of printing and alchemy were coupled together as reprehensible by the Observantine Franciscans, and their practice was forbidden under pain of disgrace and removal. Friar John Neyseeser disobeyed this rule, and “apostatized” to the Conventual branch of the Order, which was less rigid.—Chron. Glassberger ann. 1471.
[478] Doat, XXVII. 7; XXX. 185.—Rogeri Bacon Epist. de Secretis operibus Artis c. iii.—Th. Aquin. Summ. Sec. Sec. XCVI. i.—Ciruelo, Reprovacion de las Superstitiones, P. III. c. 1.—Grandes Chroniques V. 272.—Guill. Nangiac. Contin. ann. 1323.—Savonarola contra l’ Astrologia, Vinegia, 1536, fol. 33.—Ars Notoria, ap. Cornel. Agrippæ Opp. Ed. Lugduni, I. 606.—The Notory Art of Solomon, translated by Robert Turner, London, 1657.
[479] Tacit. Annal. II. 28-32; III. 22; XII. 14, 52, 68; Histor. II. 62.—Zonaræ T. II. (pp. 185, 192).—Sueton. Vitell. 14.—Tertull. de Idololat. ix.—Lib. IX. Cod. xviii. 2.—Prudent. contra Symmach. II. 449-57.—Bedæ opp. Ed. Migne I. 963-66.—Augustin. de Civ. Dei Lib. v. c. 1-7.
[480] Rolandini Chron. Lib. XII. c. 2 (Murat. S.R.I. VIII. 344).—Monach. Patavin. Chron. (Ib. VIII. 705).—Raynald. ann. 1305, No. 7.—Savonarola contra l’Astrologia, fol. 25.—Villari, Storia di Savonarola, Ed. 1887, I. 197-8.—MS. Bib. Nat., fonds latin, No. 14930, fol. 229-30.—Doat, XXXVII. 258.—Bern. Guidon. Pract. P. v.—Johann. Saresberiens. Polycrat. II. xix., xx., xxv., xxvi.—Th. Aquin. Summ. Sec. Sec. xcv.—Zanchini Tract. de Hæret. c. xxii.—D’Argentré, I. I. 263; II. 154.—Eymeric. p. 317.—Manilii Astron. Lib. IV.—Rogeri Bacon Op. Tert. c. xi. (M. R. Series I. 35-6. Cf. 559-61).
[481] P. de Abano Conciliator Different. Philos. Diff. ix., x. (Ed. Venet. 1494, fol. 14-15.). Cf. Albumasar de Magnis Conjunctionibus Tract III. Diff. i. (Aug. Vindel. 1489).
The Conciliator was a work of immense reputation. The preface of the edition of 1494 speaks of three or four previous printed editions, and there were repeated later ones up to 1596. Curiously enough, it was never included in the Roman and Spanish Indexes, though it appears in that of Lisbon of 1624 (Reusch, der Index der verbotenen Bücher, I. 35).
[482] Bayle, s. v. Apone.—G. Naudé, Apologie pour les Grands Hommes, Ch. XIV.—Muratori Antiq. Ital. III. 374-5.
For the printed works attributed to Peter of Abano, see Grässe, “Bibliotheca Magica et Pneumatica,” Leipzig, 1843. The one by which he is best known is the “Heptameron seu Elementa Magiæ,” a treatise on the invocation of demons, printed with the works of Cornelius Agrippa. This version, however, is incomplete. A fuller and better one is among the MSS. of the Bibliothèque Nationale, fonds latin, No. 17870.
[483] The Sphæra of Sacrobosco is a remarkably lucid and scientific statement of all that was known, in the thirteenth century, about the earth in its cosmical relations. Although it accepts, of course, the current theory of the nine spheres, it indulges in no astrological reveries as to the influence of the signs and planets on human destiny. It remained for centuries a work of the highest authority, and so lately as 1604, sixty years after the death of Copernicus, and on the eve of the development of the new astronomy by Galileo, it was translated, with a copious commentary, by a professor of mathematics in the University of Siena, Francesco Pifferi, whose astrological credulity offers a curious contrast to the severe simplicity of the original.