5. And in this place of Exodus where our Translators say: and the Magicians did so or in like manner with their inchantments, the word being Belahatehem ought to have been rendered, suis laminis (as we have proved before) that is, with their bright plates of metal, for the word doth not signifie Inchantments in any one place in all the Old Testament. And if truth and reason may bear any sway at all, it must be understood that they were deeply skilled in natural and lawful Magick (as generally the Ægyptians and the Eastern Nations were) though they did use and apply it to an evil end, namely the resisting the power of Gods miracles wrought by Moses and Aaron: and so by this word suis laminis, with their plates of Metal must be understood, Metalline bright plates framed under certain fit constellations, and insculped with certain figures, by which naturally (without any Diabolical assistance) they did perform strange things, and made the shapes of some things appear to the eye. And though we may be derided and laughed to scorn by the ignorant, or hardly taxed and censured by the greatest part of Cynical Criticks, yet we cannot so far stifle the knowledge of our own brains, nor be so cowardly in maintaining the truth, but we must assert, That anciently there hath been a certain lawful art, whereby some sorts of metals might be mixed together under a due constellation, and after ingraven in like fit Planetary times with sundry figures, that would naturally work strange things; And this piece of learning though it may justly be numbred amongst the Desiderata, and might very well have been placed in the Catalogue of the Deperdita of Pancirollus; yet was it well known unto the ancient Magicians, and by them often with happy success put into practise; And amongst those many noble attempts of that most learned and experienced (though much condemned) person Paracelsus, this part of learning was not the least, that he laboured to restore. The truth of which we thus prove.
Argum. 1.
Exerc. 196. 6. p. 637.
Hist. 1.
Cap. 2.
Hist. 2.
Vid. Gaffarel Unheard of curiosities, p. 165. &c.
Epist. ad Vazet.
Hist. 3.
Hist. 4.