Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/398

 382 SORCERY AND OCCULT ARTS. able to discern the aerial bodies of these creatures, and often saw them as a thick dust, or as motes in a sunbeam, or as thickly fall- ing rain. He describes their numbers as so great that the atmos- phere is merely a crowd of them ; all material sounds, water fall- ing, stones clashing, winds blowing, are their voices. Sometimes they would materialize as a woman to tempt him, or as a huge cat or a bear to terrify him, but their efforts were mostly directed to diverting the thoughts from pious duties and contemplations, and to inciting to evil passions, which they could well do, as an innu- merable army was assigned to each individual man. These ene- mies of man were ever on the watch to take advantage of every unguarded thought or act. Sprenger tells us that if an impatient husband says to a pregnant wife, " Devil take you," the child will be subject to Satan ; such children, he says, are often seen ; five nurses will not satisfy the appetite of one, and yet they are miserably emaciated, while their weight is great. Thus man was at all times exposed to the assaults of supernatural enemies, striv- ing to lead him to sin, to torture his body with disease, or to afflict him with material damage. AVe cannot understand the motives and acts of our forefathers unless we take into consideration the mental condition engendered by the consciousness of this daily and hourly personal conflict with Satan.* It is true that all demons were not equally malignant. The converted Barbarians of Europe could not wholly give up their belief in helpful spirits, and as Christianity classed them all as devils, it was necessary to find an explanation by suggesting that their characters varied with the amount of pride and envy of God which they entertained before the fall. Those who merely fol- lowed their companions and have repented are not always mali- — Pselli de Operat. Daemon. Dial. — Gregor. PP. I. Dial. i. 4. — Caesar. Heisterb. Dial. Dist. iv., v., xi. 17, xn. 5. — B. Richaluri Lib. de Insid. Daemon. (Pez The- saur. Anecd. I. n. 376).— S. Hildegardae Epist. 67 (Marter.e Ampl. Coll. II. 1100). —Mall. Maleficar. P. n. Q. 1. c. 3. It was not every one who, like St. Francis, when demons were threatening to torment him, could coolly welcome them, saying that his body was his worst enemy, and that they were free to do with it whatever Christ would permit — a view of the case which so abashed them that they incontinently departed. — Amoni, Legenda S. Francisci, Append, c. liii.
 * Origen. sup. Jesu Nave Homil. xv. 5, 6. — Ivon. Carnotens. Decret. xi. 106.