CHAPTER III.


ON THE SEVERAL KINDS OF MAGIC.

The pretended art of producing, by the assistance of words and
ceremonies, such events as are above the natural power of men, was of
several kinds, and chiefly consisted in invoking the good and
benevolent, or the wicked and malignant spirits. The first, which was
called Theurgia, was adopted by the wisest of the Pagan world, who
esteemed this as much as they despised the latter, which they called
Goetia.

Theurgia was by the philosophers accounted a divine art, which only
served to raise the mind to higher perfection, and to exalt the soul to
a greater degree of purity; and they who by means of this kind of magic,
were imagined to arrive at what is called intuition, wherein they
enjoyed an intimate intercourse with the deity, were believed to be
invested with divine power; so that it was imagined nothing was
impossible for them to perform; all who made profession of this kind of
magic aspired to this state of perfection. The priest, who was of this
order, was to be a man of unblemished morals, and all who joined with
him were bound to a strict purity of life. They were to abstain from
women, and from animal food; and were forbid to defile themselves by the
touch of a dead body. Nothing was to be forgotten in their rites and
ceremonies; the least omission or mistake, rendered all their art
ineffectual: so that this was a constant excuse for their not performing