Page:Fourth Book of Occult Philosophy, 1655.djvu/161

Of the Nature of Spirits. 137 ment: for there are some which do suppose that these Ghosts are devils, by reason of the great fear and terrour wherewith they ragingly molest men by night in their houses; and sometimes for their innate nature do do hurt. There are others that do believe these Spirits are deceitful fantasies, deceiving those that are of evil belief; who by their fallacious visions and imaginations do deceive and frighten the inhabitants in their houses: and do deny that they are Spirits indeed, because the Spirits have a body without hands and feet; wherefore they can hurt no man, nor make any tumult: being ignorant that the Angel (who also hath a body without hands and feet) did carry Habakkuk his whole dinner, by the hair of his head, into Babylon, and afterwards brought him back again, and set him in his own place; neither considering that the Spirit of the Lord, also without a body, snatched up Philip and carried him to Azotus: that I may forbear to speak concerning a certain incorporeal Spirit, which did so disquiet the house of my Grandfather, that by the space of almost thirty yeers he caused it to be uninhabitable, unless it were when a Lamp was burning therein; neither did that then sufficiently quiet the same: for going out of the house, they did so molest them with stones from above in the streets, that they would cast out of their hands the hearts of Pinetrees, which they used for torches. Concerning the Ghost that haunted the house of Anthenodorus the Philosopher, and the tumultuous spirit of C. Caligula, there may more be spoken: but thou hast understood the relations of them already in the foregoing discourse. From all which, we may easily convince the opinions of those, who deny that the Spirits can walk, or make any motion; but of how much truth we may hold the assertions of them, who do suppose that these tumultuous Spirits are neither devils, nor phantasms, but the souls of the dead, now hearken unto.

Poll. Are there they who are of that opinion?

Caft. There are they who are of both opinions: for they do declare that these are the f=souls of them who have departed from their bodies laden and clogged in their sins; which

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