Page:The history of Witchcraft and demonology.djvu/74

 writes, in answer to the question, whether the Devil desired to be “as God,” “if by this we mean equality with God, then the Devil would not desire it, since he knew this to be impossible.” But as the Venerable Duns Scotus, Doctor subtilis, admirably points out, we must distinguish between efficacious volition and the volition of complaisance, and by the latter act an angel could desire that which is impossible. In the same way he shows that, though a creature cannot directly will its own destruction, it may do this consequenter, i.e. it can will something from which this would inevitably follow.

And although man must realize that he cannot be God, yet there have been men who have caused themselves to be saluted as God and even worshipped as God. Such was Herod Agrippa I, who on a festival day at Cæsarea, had himself robed in a garment made wholly of silver, and came into the crowded theatre early in the morning, so that his vesture shone out in the rays of the sun with dazzling light, and the superstitious multitude, taught by his flatterers, cried out that he was a god, and prayed to him as divine, saying: “Be thou merciful unto us, for although we have hitherto reverenced thee only as a man yet henceforth we own thee to be god.” Caligula, also, arrogated to himself divinity. “Templum etiam numini suo proprium, et sacerdotes et excogitatissimas hostias instituit.” (He also built a temple in honour of his own godhead, and consecrated priests to offer him most splendid sacrifices.) This emperor, moreover, set up his statue in the Temple at Jerusalem, and ordered victims to be sacrificed to him. Domitian, with something more than literary compliment, is addressed by Martial as “Dominus Deusque noster” (Our Lord and our God), and he lived up to his title. Heliogabalus identified himself in some mystic way with the deity of Edessa, and ordered no god save himself to be worshipped at Rome, nay, throughout the wide world: “Taking measures that at Rome no god should be honoured save Heliogabalus alone. . . . Nor did he wish to stamp out only the various Roman cults, but his desire was that all the whole wide world through, only one god, Heliogabalus, should everywhere be worshipped.” To cite further examples, and they are numerous, from Roman history were superfluous. Perhaps the most