ANIE affirme (upon a fable cited by M. Mal.) that spirits are of aier, bicause they have beene cut (as he saith) in sunder, and closed presentlie againe; and also bicause they vanish awaie so suddenlie. But of such apparitions I have alreadie spoken, and am shortlie to saie more, which are rather seene in the imagination of the weake and diseased, than in veritie and truth. Which sights and apparitions, as they have beene common among the unfaithfull; so now, since the preaching of the gospell they are most rare. And as among faintharted people; namelie, women, children, and sicke folkes, they usuallie swarmed: so among strong bodies and good stomachs they never used to appeare; as elsewhere I have prooved: which argueth that they were onelie phantasticall and imaginarie. Now saie they that imagine divels and spirits to be made of aier, that it must needs be that they consist of that element; bicause otherwise when they vanish suddenlie awaie, they should leave some earthie substance behind them. If they were of water, then should they moisten the place where they stand, and must needs be shed on the floore. If they consisted of fier, then would they burne anie thing that touched them: and yet (saie they) Abraham and LotGen. 18, 19. washed their feete, and were neither scalded nor burnt.
I find it not in the Bible, but in Bodin,J. Bod. lib. de dæm. 3. ca. 4. that there are daie divels, and night divels. The same fellow saith, that Deber is the name of that divell, which hurteth by night; and Cheleb is he that hurteth by daie: howbeit, he confesseth that Sathan can hurt both by daie and by night; although it be certeine (as he saith) that he can doo more harme by night than by daie; producing for example, how in a night he slew the first borne of Ægypt./518. And yet it appeareth plainelie in the text, that the Lord himselfe did it.Exod. 12 29. Whereby it seemeth, that Bodin putteth no difference betweene God and the divell. For further confirmation of this his foolish assertion, that divels are more valiant by night than by daie, he alledgeth the 104. Psalme,Psa. 104. 20. wherein is written, Thou makest darknesse, and it is night, wherein all the beasts of the forrest creepe foorth, the lions rore, &c: when the sunne riseth, they retire, &c. So as now he maketh all beasts to be divels, or divels to be beasts. Oh barbarous blindnes! This Bodin J. Bod. lib. de dæm. 3. ca. 5. also saith, that the divell loveth no salt in his meate, for that it is a signe of eternitie, and used by Gods commandement in all sacrifices; abusing the scriptures,Levit. 1. which he is not ashamed to quote in that behalfe. But now I will declare how the scripture teacheth our dull capacities to conceive what maner of thing the divell is, by the verie names appropriated unto him in the same./
The xix. Chapter.372.
That such divels as are mentioned in the scriptures, have in their names their nature and qualities expressed, with instancies thereof.
UCH divels as are mentioned in the scriptures by name, have in their names their nature and qualities expressed, being for the most part the idols of certeine nations idolatrouslie erected, in steed, or rather in spight of God. For Beelzebub,2. Reg. 13. which signifieth the lord of the flies, bicause he taketh everie simple thing in his web, was an idol or oracle erected at Ekron, to whom Ahaziah sent to know whether he should recover his disease: as though there had beene no God in Israell. This divell Beelzebub was among the JewesMatth. 10. & 12.
Mark. 3.
Luk. 11. reputed the principall divell. The Græcians called him Pluto, the Latines Sumanus, quasi summum deorum manium, the cheefe ghost or spirit of the dead whom they supposed to walke by night: although they absurdlie beleeved also that the soule died with the bodie. So as they did put a difference be/tweene519. the ghost of a man and the soule of a man: and so doo our papists; howbeit, none otherwise, but that the soule is a ghost, when it walketh on the earth, after the dissolution of the bodie, or appeareth to anie man, either out of heaven, hell, or purgatorie, and not otherwise. aNisrocha 2. Reg. 19. signifieth a delicate tentation, and was worshipped by Senacherib in Assyria. bb 2. Reg. 17.Tarcat*[* Tartac] is in English, fettered, and was the divell or idoll of the Hevites. cBeelphegor,c Ose. 9, 11. [10]
Num. 25.
Deut. 3. &. 4
Josu. 22. otherwise called Priapus, the gaping or naked god was worshipped among the Moabits. dAdramelech,d 2. Reg. 17. that is, the cloke or power of the king, was an idoll at Sepharvais, which was a citie of the Assyrians. eChamos,e Numb. 21.
1. Reg. 11.
2. Reg. 23. that is feeling, or departing, was worshipped among the Moabits. fDagon,f Judg. 16.
1. Macc. 10. that is, corne or greefe, was the idoll of the Philistines. gAstarte,g 1. Reg. 11.
2. Reg. 23. that is, a fold or flocke, is the name of a shee idoll at Sydonia, whom Salomon worshipped: some thinke it was Venus. hMelchom,h 2. Reg. 23.
1. Chro. 20.
Jerem. 49. that is, a king, was an idoll or divell, which the sonnes of Ammon worshipped.
Sometimes also we find in the scriptures, that divels and spirits take their names of wicked men, or of the houses or stats of abhominable persons: as Astaroth, which (as Josephus saith)Joseph. lib. de antiquit.
Judæor. 6. cap. 14.
1. Sam. 7.
2. Reg. 23. was the idoll of the Philistines, whome the Jewes tooke from them at Salomons commandement, and was also worshipped of Salomon. Which though it signifie riches, flocks, &c: yet it was once a citie belonging to Og the king of Basan, where they saie the giants dwelt. In these respects Astaroth is one of the speciall divels named in Salomons conjuration, and greatlie emploied by the conjurors. I have sufficientlie prooved in these quotations, that these idols are Dii gentium, the gods of the Gentiles: and then the prophet David may satisfie you, that they are divels, who saith Dii gentium dæmonia sunt,Psal. 96. [Vulg. vers.] The gods of the Gentiles are divels. What a divell was the rood of grace to be thought, but such a one as before is mentioned and described, who tooke his name of his courteous and gratious behaviour towards his worshippers, or rather those that offered/373. unto him? The idolatrous knaverie wherof being now bewraied, it is among the godlie reputed a divell rather than a god: and so are diverse others of the same stampe./
The xx. Chapter.520.
Diverse names of the divell, whereby his nature and disposition is manifested.
