Crystallomancy is the art of divining by figures, which appear on the surface of a crystal ball, in like manner as on the phial filled with water. Concerning this practice, Delrio has the following remarkable passage, citing his contemporary, Spengler: "A man well versed in the Greek and Latin fathers, and happy, if he had not presumed, with unclean hands, to dabble in the mysteries of our faith (Spenger), has published in Germany a learned commentary on the nature of demons, which he has prefixed to Plutarch's Essay, De Defectu Oraculorum. From this (says Delrio) I extract, in his own words, the following narrative. There are some (he says) who, being consulted on matters unknown, distinctly see every thing that is inquired after in crystals; and a little further on proceeds to state, that he once had an acquaintance, a man of one of the best families of Nuremberg, and that this acquaintance of his came to him on one occasion, bringing with him a crystal gem, of a round form, wrapped up in a piece of silk, which he told him he had received from a stranger, who encountering him several years before in the market-place, had asked his hospitality, and whom he had brought home with him and lodged for the space of three days; and that when the stranger was departing, he had left him the crystal as a present, in token of his obligation, and had taught him the use of it; thus, that if there was any thing he particularly wished to be informed of, he should take out this crystal and desire a pure male child to look into it and say what he should see there; and that it would come to pass that whatever he desired to be informed of, would be indicated by appearances seen by the boy. And he affirmed that he never was deceived in any instance, and that he learned matters of a wonderful kind from the representations of those boys, although no one else, by the closest inspection, could see any thing except the clear and shining gem. At a certain time, however, when his wife was pregnant of a male child, appearances were visible to her also in the crystal. First of all, there used to appear the form of a man clad in the ordinary habit of the times, and then would open the representation of whatever was inquired after; and when all was explained, the same figure of the man would depart and disappear; but in his departure would often appear to perambulate the town and enter the churches. But the report of these appearances having spread in all directions, they began to be threatened by the populace. It also appeared, that certain men of learning had read in the crystal some statements respecting doubts entertained by them in their studies; and moved by these and other reasons, Spengler stated that the owner of the crystal came to him, representing that he thought the time was come when he ought to cease making such a use of it; for that he was now persuaded he had sinned in no light degree in doing so, and had for a long time suffered grievous pangs of a disturbed conscience on that account, and had come to the determination of having nothing further to do with experiments of that kind, and had accordingly brought the crystal to him to do with it whatever he pleased. Then Spengler, highly approving his resolution, states that he took the crystal, and having pounded it into minute fragments, threw them, together with[pg 201] the silk wrapper, into a draw-well." So far Delrio.
Another variety of this process is found in the Onuchomanteia, or nail-divinition, also spoken of by Delrio. "In this species," says he, "male children, before they have lost their purity, smear their nails with oil and lamp-black, and then, holding up the nail against the sun, repeating some charm, see in it what they desire. This mischief," he goes on to say, "has gone even farther in our own time. I myself knew one Quevedo, a veteran Spanish soldier, but more distinguished in war and arms than in piety, who, being in Brussels at the time when the Duke of Medina Cæli set sail from Gallicia for Belgium, clearly showed in more than one of his nails the fleet leaving the port of Corunna, and soon after dreadfully tossed by a tempest. Thus this man, who could also cure the wounds of others by his words alone, rendered his own spiritual state incurable by any one."
The like use of the crystal ball and spherical phial, containing water, suggests a version of the epigrams of Claudian—"De crystallo in quo aqua inclusa"—which has not been afforded by any of the commentators. Globules of water are sometimes found inclosed in crystals, as well as in amber. On one of those singular gems Claudian has composed a series of epigrams, which ascribe properties to the stone, and make allusion to uses of it hardly reconcileable with the idea of its being a merely puerile curiosity. The earlier epigrams of the series are neat and playful, but insignificant:—
"The icy gem its aqueous birth attests,
Part turned to stone, while part in fluid rests;
Winter's numbed hand achieved the cunning feat,
The perfecter for being incomplete.
"Nymphs who your sister nymphs in glassy thrall
Hold here imprisoned in the crystal ball;
Waters that were and are, declare the cause