Some infernal Duke would appear in his proper character, quietly seated on a griffin; another spirit of a similar rank would display the three heads of a serpent, a man, and a cat; he would also bestride a viper, and carry in his hand a firebrand; another of the same stamp, would appear like a duchess, encircled with a fiery zone, and mounted on a camel; a fourth would wear the aspect of a boy, and amuse himself on the back of a two-headed dragon. A few spirits, however, would be content with the simple garbs of a horse, a leopard, a lion, an unicorn, a night-raven, a stork, a peacock, or a dromedary; the latter animal speaking fluently the Egyptian language. Others would assume the more complex forms of a lion or of a dog, with a griffin’s wings attached to each of their shoulders; or of a bull equally well gifted; or of the same animal, distinguished by the singular appendage of a man’s face; or of a crow clothed with human flesh; or of a hart with a fiery tail. To certain other noble devils were assigned such shapes as those of a dragon with three heads, one of these being human; of a wolf with a serpent’s tail, breathing forth flames of fire; of a she wolf exhibiting the same caudal appendage, together with a griffin’s wings, and ejecting hideous matter from the mouth. A lion would appear either with the head of a branded thief, or astride upon a black horse, and playing with a viper, or adorned with the tail of a snake, and grasping in his paws two hissing serpents. These were the varied shapes assumed by devils of rank. To those of an inferior order were consigned upon earth, the duty of carrying away condemned souls. These were described as blacker than pitch: as having teeth like lions, nails on their fingers like those of the wild boar, on their forehead horns, through the extremities of which, poison was emitted, having wide ears flowing with corruption, and discharging serpents from their nostrils, and having cloven feet[[54]]. But this last appendage, as Sir Thomas Brown has learnedly proved, is a mistake, which has arisen from the devil frequently appearing to the Jews in the shape of a rough and hairy goat, this animal being the emblem of sin-offerings[[55]].
It is worthy of farther remark, says Dr. Hibbert, that the forms of the demons described by St. Bernard, differs little from that which is no less carefully pourtrayed by Reginald Scott, 350 years later, and, perhaps, by the Demonologists of the present day. “In our childhood,” says he, “our mothers’ maids have so terrified us with an ouglie devell having hornes on his head, fier in his mouth, and a taile in his breech, eies like a bason, fangs like a dog, clawes like a bear, a skin like a tiger, and a voice roaring like a lion,—whereby we start and are afraid when we heare one cry bough.”
It is still an interesting matter of speculation worth noticing—why, after the decay of the regular systems of demonology taught in the middle ages, the same hideous form should still be attached to the devil? The learned Mede has remarked, “that the devil could not appear in human shape while man was in his integrity; because he was a spirit fallen from his first glorious perfection; and, therefore, must appear in such a shape which might argue his imperfection and abasement, which was the shape of a beast; otherwise, no reason can be given, why he should not rather have appeared to Eve in the shape of a woman than of a serpent. But since the fall of man, the case is altered: now we know he can take upon him the shape of man. He appears, it seems, in the shape of man’s imperfection, either for age or deformity, as like an old man (for so the witches say); and perhaps it is not altogether false, which is vulgarly affirmed, that the devil appearing in human shape, has always a deformity of some uncouth member or other, as though he could not yet take upon him human shape entirely, for that man himself is not entirely and utterly fallen as he is.” Grose, with considerable less seriousness, observes, that “although the devil can partly transform himself into a variety of shapes, he cannot change his cloven feet, which will always mark him under every appearance.
The late Dr. Ferriar took some trouble to trace to their real source spectral figures, which have been attributed to demoniacal visits. In his observations on the works of Remy, the commissioner in Lorraine, for the trial of witches, he makes the following remark:—“My edition of this book was printed by Vincente, at Lyons, in 1595; it is entitled Dæmonolatria. The trials appear to have begun in 1583. Mr. Remy seems to have felt great anxiety to ascertain the exact features and dress of the demons, with whom many people supposed themselves to be familiar. Yet nothing transpired in his examinations, which varied from the usual figures exhibited by the gross sculptures and paintings of the middle age. They are said to be black faced, with sunk but fiery eyes, their mouths wide and swelling of sulphur, their hands hairy, with claws, their feet horny and cloven.” In another part of Dr. Ferriar’s, the following account is also given of a case which passed under his own observation:—“I had occasion,” he observes, “to see a young married woman, whose first indication of illness was a spectral delusion. She told me that her apartment appeared to be suddenly filled with devils, and that her terror impelled her to quit the house with great precipitation. When she was brought back, she saw the whole staircase filled with diabolical forms, and was in agonies of fear for several days. After the first impression wore off, she heard a voice tempting her to self destruction, and prohibiting her from all exercises of piety. Such was the account given by her when she was sensible of the delusion, yet unable to resist the horror of the impression. When she was newly recovered, I had the curiosity to question her, as I have interrogated others, respecting the forms of the demons with which she had been claimed; but I never could obtain any other account, than that they were very small, very much deformed, and had horns and claws like the imps of our terrific modern romances.” To this illustration of the general origin of the figures of demoniacal illusions, I might observe, that, in the case of a patient suffering under delirium tremens, which came under my notice, the devils who flitted around his bed were described to me as exactly like the forms that he had recently seen exhibited on the stage in the popular drama of Don Giovanni.
With the view of illustrating other accounts of apparitions, I shall now return to the doctrine of demonology which was once taught. Although the leading tenets of this occult science may be traced to the Jews and early Christians, yet they were matured by our early communication with the Moors of Spain, who were the chief philosophers of the dark ages, and between whom and the natives of France and Italy, a great communication subsisted. Toledo, Seville, and Salamanca, became the greatest schools of magic. At the latter city, prelections on the black art were, from a consistent regard to the solemnity of the subject, delivered within the walls of a vast and gloomy cavern. The schoolmen taught, that all knowledge might be obtained from the assistance of the fallen angels. They were skilled in the abstract sciences, in the knowledge of precious stones, in alchymy, in the various languages of mankind and of the lower animals, in the belles lettres, in moral philosophy, pneumatology, divinity, magic, history, and prophecy. They could controul the winds, the waters, and the influence of the stars; they could raise earthquakes, induce diseases, or cure them, accomplish all vast mechanical undertakings, and release souls out of purgatory. They could influence the passions of the mind—procure the reconciliation of friends or foes—engender mutual discord—induce mania and melancholy—or direct the force and objects of the sexual affections.
Such was the object of demonology, as taught by its most orthodox professors. Yet other systems of it were devised, which had their origin in causes attending the propagation of Christianity. For it must have been a work of much time to eradicate the universal belief, that the Pagan deities, who had become so numerous as to fill every part of the universe, were fabulous beings. Even many learned men were induced to side with the popular opinion on the subject, and did nothing more than endeavour to reconcile it with their acknowledged systems of demonology. They taught that such heathen objects of reverence were fallen angels in league with the prince of darkness, who, until the appearance of our Saviour, had been allowed to range on the earth uncontrolled, and to involve the world in spiritual darkness and delusion. According to the various ranks which these spirits held in the vast kingdom of Lucifer, they were suffered, in their degraded state, to take up their abode in the air, in mountains, in springs, or in seas. But, although the various attributes ascribed to the Greek and Roman deities, were, by the early teachers of Christianity, considered in the humble light of demoniacal delusions, yet for many centuries they possessed great influence over the minds of the vulgar. In the reign of Adrian, Evreux, in Normandy, was not converted to the Christian faith, until the devil, who had caused the obstinacy of the inhabitants, was finally expelled from the temple of Diana. To this goddess, during the persecution of Dioclesian, oblations were rendered by the inhabitants of London. In the 5th century, the worship of her existed at Turin, and incurred the rebuke of St. Maximus. From the ninth to the fifteenth century, several denunciations took place of the women who, in France and Germany, travelled over immense spaces of the earth, acknowledging Diana as their mistress and conductor. In rebuilding St. Paul’s cathedral, in London, remains of several of the animals used in her sacrifices were found; for slight traces of this description of reverence, subsisted so late as the reign of Edward the First, and of Mary. Apollo, also, in an early period of Christianity, had some influence at Thorney, now Westminster. About the 11th century, Venus formed the subject of a monstrous apparition, which could only have been credited from the influence which she was still supposed to possess. A young man had thoughtlessly put his ring around the marble finger of her image. This was construed by the Cyprian goddess as a plighted token of marriage; she accordingly paid a visit to her bridegroom’s bed at night, nor could he get rid of his bed-fellow until the spells of an exorcist had been invoked for his relief. In the year 1536, just before the volcanic eruption of Mount Etna, a Spanish merchant, while travelling in Sicily, saw the apparition of Vulcan attended by twenty of his Cyclops, as they were escaping from the effects which the over heating of his furnace foreboded[[56]].
To the superstitions of Greece and Rome, we are also indebted for those subordinate evil spirits called genii, who for many centuries were the subject of numerous spectral illusions. A phantasm of this kind appeared to Brutus in his tent, prophesying that he should be again seen at Philippi. Cornelius Sylla had the first intimation of the sudden febrile attack with which he was seized, from an apparition who addressed him by his name; concluding, therefore, that his death was at hand, he prepared himself for the event, which took place the following evening. The poet Cassius Severus, a short time before he was slain by order of Augustus, saw, during the night, a human form of gigantic size,—his skin black, his beard squalid, and his hair dishevelled. The phantasm was, perhaps, not unlike the evil genius of Lord Byron’s Manfred:—
“I see a dusk and awful figure rise
Like an infernal god from out the earth;
His face wrapt in a mantle, and his form