сн. v The Men of Old Accredited Witches with Marvellous Deeds

Jonh of Salisbury * says that, when God permits, witches can with the help of demons shake the elements together and alter the true appearance of things. They can foretell much of the future. They confuse the minds of men with dreams; and merely by the potency of their charms can cause death, etc. Saxo Grammaticus t writes that giants and sorcerers in the North practised unheard-of wonders with various illusions, and could so skilfully deceive men's eyes that they hid their own features and those of others under various fantasms, and obscured the true shape of things under seductive forms, and did other marvels like those which we have already told of Simon Magus. Pythagoras made his thigh appear to be golden, and by his spells tamed an eagle with which he often conversed. Baianus die King of Bulgaria was seen to change himself whenever he would into a wolf or any other animal, and sometimes did so in such a manner that no one perceived it. Glycas * tells of Simon Magus, besides what we have already mentioned, that once when Caesar would have apprehended him he was stricken with terror and escaped by leaving another man in bis own likeness. He says also that he had a dog chained to the door of his house, which devoured those who tried to come in without his permission: but the dog told S. Peter to enter, and announced in human speech that S. Peter was present. You see how the power of the devil yielded to the divine virtue in S. Peter; for that Cerberus fawned upon S. Peter and was unable to harm him. Numa Pompilius produced a sumptuous feast when he had no food in his house. OUerus sailed over the open sea on an enchanted bone as if it were a ship, as we arc told by John Trithemius in his Chronica Hersaugicnsis. Eric, King of the Goths, could draw a favourable wind from any quarter by turning his hat towards it. Apulciusf himself, according to many, was skilled in magic, and he relates a wonderful story of two women, the first of whom was a Queen among witches, as follows.

It is certain that all the wonders we have just instanced were due to some magic illusion. But the Saints, as S. Paul§ says {Hebr. xi, 34), performed miracles and wonders in the name of God and in perfect faith: "The Saints through faith quenched the violence of fire," as did the Hebrew children, and S. Francis of Paula, and many others. Hear the following example of faith and praiseworthy religious obedience.

Bernardino Scardeone writes as follows. A certain Dominican Prior of the Preaching Friars was invited to dine with the Jesuates, the sons of Blessed John Colombini, and sat down (...)