Liber Octo Quaestionum ad Maximilianum Caesarem

The Book of Eight Questions addressed to Emperor Maximilian, by Johannes Trithemius, abbot of St. James at Würzburg, formerly of Sponheim. Oppenheim, 1515.

[Source page illegible in the scan; the page image is the authoritative witness.]

Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Saint James at Würzburg, formerly of Sponheim: The Book of Eight Questions to Emperor Maximilian.

With the privilege of the imperial majesty: that it not be printed in his kingdom, empire, and lands, nor copies printed elsewhere sold there, within ten years, under the penalties expressed in the privilege, of ten marks of gold and the loss of all those books, etc.

Epigram of Richard Sbrulius of Friuli.

Who could deny that there is a God, parent of heaven and earth? No one is so savage as to deny that there is a God.

God himself is worshipped everywhere throughout the whole world; he is sought by different paths, yet he is the same.

The barbarian worships him, admonishing all things by a fixed law; he denies incense to the holy Son and to the Spirit.

The Hebrew boasts that he holds the true doctrines, and, with Moses as his leader, thinks himself to be the race of God.

But the people of Christ, who took their name from his name, steadfastly sings that God is triune.

Maximilian, greatest in empire, who presides over the realm, continually aids the cause and honor of Christ.

He asks, as it is right for an august king to ask such things, why the highest God permits there to be so many sects.

Why does he not reveal himself equally to all mortals? He is the leader and ornament of the hooded flock.

Whoever you are who used to doubt concerning the holy faith, you will read these things; soon you will be a certain foster-child of Christ.

End.

To the most serene and unconquered lord of the world, Emperor Maximilian: Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of [Peapolitanus?], The Book of Eight Questions. In the name of Christ begins [the book] of the monastery of Benedictbeuern.

I have obeyed your commands, most unconquered Emperor Maximilian, and have set down in this little book those eight questions which you formerly proposed to me, when I had been summoned to your Highness in the castle of Boppard, resolving them with what brevity I could.

You wished, however, if I remember correctly, that, so far as possible in their solution, I should follow the path of nature, on account of those who yield less to belief. Yet this did not seem possible to me in all matters, because the subject matter of the questions in many places rested upon theological rather than natural principles. For although the Christian religion, among all the sects of mortals, is held to be more closely conformed to the laws of nature, nevertheless the principal articles of our faith are not all provable according to the common path of nature. We believe that this was necessarily done so that faith might have a place, and that firm belief might not lack its own merit.

Therefore, entering upon the middle path of disputation, as far as my powers allowed and by command, I have used partly nature, and partly also the testimony of the divine Scriptures. For truly, the things which it is fitting for us to believe are not to be rashly examined by human arguments, since, as the holy Gregory says, faith has no merit when human reason supplies proof for it. Therefore, with fear of God, reverence

of our undefiled Christian religion, I resolved to answer the questions proposed in such a way that I should depart from the definitions of the Roman Church neither in jest nor in earnest. Therefore whatever I have ever written or shall write, I wish all of it to be subject to its determination and judgment.

On Faith and Understanding, the First Question

The first question of your most serene majesty was this: Why did the all-good God wish to be believed by mortals rather than to be known and understood, namely in that mode of knowledge and understanding by which he is known and understood by the holy angels?

I remember that, when this question was put before your most sacred majesty, I answered as follows. Almighty God, who is without beginning, pure, everlasting, and unchangeable intellect, existing above every position knowable to us, far more perfect than infinite perfections, by his most wise will created from nothing at the beginning two intellects, namely the angelic and the human. The angelic intellect, at the beginning of its creation, was made in act with respect to all knowable things, and it knew all things. The human intellect, however, at first consists in potency with respect to all things, but is ignorant of all things. Yet in the end, through many continual upward actions, it will become like the angelic, knowing both God and all things that pertain to the knowledge of the promised knowledge and understanding.

The angelic and human intellects differ as any two opposites do, namely act and potency, light and darkness, knowledge and ignorance, habit and privation, beginning and end, immobile and mobile, substance and accident, truth and likeness, nature and art, health and infirmity, whole and part. For the angelic intellect is as act, light, knowledge, habit, beginning, immobile, immediate, simple substance, truth, nature, and whole. The human intellect, however, is as potency, darkness, ignorance, privation, end, mobile, mediated, composite, accident, likeness, art, and part.

Hence whatever things belong to the angelic intellect from the beginning, these same things belong to the human intellect at the end, after it has laid aside the burden of flesh; for just as the beginning perfects the angelic intellect by nature, so the end, by art, after many exercises at last raises the human intellect upward. Therefore between these two intellects there is great inequality from the beginning; nevertheless in the end they are at last made equal, where the human intellect will be as great by art as the angelic had previously been by nature.

Hence it is clear that the angelic intellect, as soon as it was created, from the beginning, without any action or motion of its own, knew by nature, immovably and substantially, all things that it can understand, and as a creature became in an instant full and perfect with the knowledge of all things. But since the human intellect was created in ignorance and privation of all things, and was temporally destined for a body for its own exercise, it must by continual action, motion, and art come to knowledge of God and of all things. The end will at last make it equal to the angelic intellect, changing its potency into act and bringing it from the merely potential and possible into essence; from empty it will make it full, from imperfect perfect, from deprived possessing, from dark luminous, from nocturnal diurnal, from lunar solar, from earthly heavenly. This cannot happen while the mind is bound in the body, as the holy Christ-loving Paul says: As long as we are in the flesh, we are pilgrims away from the Lord.

To know God belongs to a pure, simple, and perfect intellect. But the human intellect, as long as it dwells in the body, is impure, mixed, unstable, and imperfect; for this reason it is ignorant of the knowledge of God, namely of that highest thing among things. But of both intellects, namely the human and the angelic, the object is the same: God, the supreme and single object of all things, toward which [unclear]; God, the single principle of things, toward which [unclear].

with a natural inclination toward cognition, they return. But if the angelic is compared with the human, it is as nature is to art, and as intellect simply speaking is to reason, which is closely joined to disciplinary principles, whereas reason runs through principles to conclusions. Hence it is manifest that the angelic intellect apprehends its proper object immovably; toward this the human intellect, through the angelic medium, after many exercises of itself, as has been said, at last, by reasoning, prepares an ascent for itself. But the human intellect is separated, by the medium of angelic cognition, from the perfection of its natural object, and therefore necessarily becomes mobile, returning through that medium to its own principle. For every motion is made from one extreme through a middle to an extreme; but where there is no middle, the extremes are already immediately proximate, and for this reason immobile. But the human intellect, placed as it were in a dark prison so long as it is held in the body, is moved by sense and reason to understand, although confusedly and much too imperfectly; and for that reason it admits a medium between itself and God, which we have called angelic, bearing the body as a very great impediment to its destined perfection. Indeed a lover of wisdom said: The body that is corrupted weighs down the soul, and the earthly habitation depresses the sense that thinks many things. Therefore it was altogether necessary for us to believe God rather than to know or understand him, because it is utterly impossible for that super-divine, uncircumscribable majesty to be comprehended by us, who understand nothing without the ministry of the senses and the discourse of reason. But God, existing far above every position, remains subject neither to the senses of mortals nor to reason, as he is read to have said to Moses: No man shall see me and live. Hence also the divine evangelist John says: No one has ever seen God. Nor is it any wonder. For since God is the first, eternal, purest, simplest, most perfect, immobile intellect; the creator, incomprehensible, highest, and far above every position, immeasurable and uncircumscribable, he could not be comprehended by the human intellect, which is impure, subject to composition, imperfect, mobile, created, comprehensible, lowest, and established under the measure of position.

But as to that question which seemed to arise from the first, whether God, since he is omnipotent, could have made himself knowable to the human intellect just as to the angelic, I say that no one of sound mind has ever denied that God can do all things. But we say that God cannot do those things which involve contradiction, because they are contrary to the order of wisdom that immutably disposes all things, just as they are not doubted to be contrary to the destruction of the whole; and if I shall say it, utterly opposed. For it neither was fitting, nor could in any way have happened, that God should be comprehended by the human intellect, since if mortal man, by the dictate of nature, comprehended immortal God, certainly he would no longer seem to have to be called man or mortal, but angel; and either man would have to be compared to God, or God to man. For as long as the angelic intellect stands between, the human cannot understand God. And it stands between until the death of the flesh, when the mind, having obtained natural liberty, escapes, wholly equal to the angel. You see now, I believe, emperor, that it is manifest that it neither was fitting nor was possible that the human intellect should comprehend the divine: the created, the creator; the temporal, the eternal; the mutable, the immutable; the weak, the omnipotent, since, as a certain philosopher says, there is no proportion of the finite to the infinite. It is therefore necessary for mortals to believe in immortal God, whom we can comprehend by no manifest reasoning. Although the order of the whole universe declares an author who provides for all things, and although we understand nothing besides him to have been brought forth into being without a beginning, nevertheless what God is and in what manner he is, the human mind cannot grasp:

Since he is far above all things that we, or any mortal, can understand concerning him, he is far beyond and above every affirmation, as holy Dionysius says. For he is neither soul, nor sense; nor does he have imagination or opinion, or reason, or understanding; nor is he reason, nor understanding; nor is he spoken of, nor understood. Nor is he number, nor multitude, nor order, nor magnitude, nor smallness, nor equality, nor likeness, nor unlikeness; nor does he stand, nor is he moved; nor does he bring about rest, nor have power; nor is he power; nor is he light; nor does he live, nor is he life; nor is he substance, nor age, nor time; nor is there any spiritual contact with him; nor is he form, nor truth, nor kingdom, nor wisdom, nor one; nor is there denomination of son or father; nor is he any of those things that are known to us or to anyone else in the world. Nor is he any of those things that are not; nor do any of the things that are have knowledge of him, [unclear] as he himself is. Nor is there speech of him, nor error, nor truth. For the perfect and singular cause of all things is also above every affirmation. And his excellence, namely of him who is simply released from all things and is above all things, is above every negation. Therefore we say, Dionysius says, that since he is [the cause?] of all things, he is neither without substance nor without life; nor does he lack reason or mind; nor is he body, nor figure, nor species; nor does he have quality, quantity, or bulk. Nor is he in a place, nor is he perceived, nor does he have sensible touch; nor does he sense, nor is he sensible; nor is he subject to rashness or disturbance, agitated by fleshly passions. Nor is he weak, subject to sensible accidents; nor is he in need of light, nor does he admit change, corruption, division, or flux; nor is he or does he have any other thing belonging to sensibles. Hence, since he is far above every affirmation, excelling [unclear], he could not be comprehended by a creature that necessarily uses the senses for understanding; as the true Peripatetic said, that there is nothing in our intellect unless it has first been in sense. Therefore God, who is not subject to the senses of mortals, far exceeds human understanding: according to affirmative positing he is truly altogether in all things, and according to negative removal, the nearer he is approached, he is none of all the things that are subject to the knowledge of mortals. Indeed, since he is above all things, he can be none of those things that are subject to him. Therefore Empedocles beautifully gave a likeness, saying: God is a sphere whose center is everywhere, whose circumference is nowhere. Let human understanding now raise itself as much as it can; and let him who strives to comprehend God comprehend, if he rightly understands it, the center of this imagined sphere and at the same time its nowhere-ending circumference. But if he is not capable of understanding this proposition of the likeness properly, why does he strive to investigate the essence of God, which exists above every affirmation? May it not weary you, most unconquered Caesar, to hear another likeness concerning God from Cusanus, formerly cardinal priest of the Roman Church, my fellow Mosellan, a man most learned in those times, who says: God is a straight line of infinite length, which makes a circle. Now then let us see. If it is a straight line, how does it make a circle? But if it makes a circle, how is it straight? For a circle and a straight line are naturally opposed. Nevertheless, a line of infinite length, since it has neither beginning nor end, necessarily makes a circle, although it is proposed to be imagined not as curved but as straight. Since therefore God is infinite, greatest without quantity, best without quality, all things in all without circumscription, above all things without an excluding position:

it was not possible that he should be comprehended by the circumscribable human intellect, which uses the service of the senses for understanding; and that what is promised to it when purified at last in the fatherland should be granted to it, confused and impure, on the way. But after our mind, at last released from the flesh, has [unclear] escaped to its own center, made equal to the angels, we shall know God perfectly, and all things, just as the holy Apostle says to the Corinthians: “Now we see through a mirror and in an enigma; but then face to face.” Therefore we said that the angelic intellect, by the guidance of its nature, adheres immovably to its own principle, because it is pure act and habit; and since it is naturally simple in condition, it can be hindered by no traffic of composition. But the human intellect, as it is now sufficiently established has been declared, since it is potentiality and privation, is impure because of its commerce with its body; indeed it is so far held back from perfect act until at last, released from the flesh, it shall have passed into the fellowship of likeness with the angels, then for the first time to be admitted to the true knowledge of God. But if meanwhile the affection of love, necessary for salvation, is joined to present Christian faith and future divine knowledge, the same eternal blessedness prepared for God’s worshippers will be granted with the holy angels. But if a depraved mind, through too much commerce with its flesh, has scorned the love of God, then indeed the intellect, released from its prison-house, will escape to the knowledge sublime in the measure belonging to it by nature; but it will be the more wretched, the more by evil will it is found to be like the demons. Therefore, to conclude as I may the solution of the question proposed, I say that it is not possible that almighty God be perfectly understood by us so long as, mortal, we dwell in the flesh.

On Faith Necessary for Salvation: The Second Question.

The second question of your unconquered majesty was this. Since today only a small part of the world is subject to the laws of the Christian faith: whether that opinion of very many people seems admissible without injury to the truth, who think that each person, in his own religion which he believes to be true and saving, as a worshipper of one God, can be saved outside the Christian faith without baptism, provided that nothing is known of the religion of Christ.

To respond to this question simply, according to the common intention, I judged superfluous, since I know that today many among Christians, through what is as it were an impious piety for the salvation of lost men, make themselves cruel toward God. But because the cause of just consideration moved your most serene highness to ask these things, not because you do not know what must be held as Catholic in this position, but so that you might have something true to set against those who attack it, I shall answer the questions, as briefly as I can. If anyone could be saved outside the Christian faith, Christ, the Son of almighty God, would seem to have been made man superfluously and without cause. For if there is salvation outside Christ, Christ is not the savior of all. But because it was necessary, according to the Scriptures, that the only-begotten Son of God, for the salvation of the human race, be born a man in the world, suffer, die, and rise again on the third day, he did not come into this world in vain, nor superfluously, nor without cause. Since this is so, whoever asserts that anyone can be saved outside the faith of Christ shows himself not a Christian but an adversary of the faith and a deserter of Christ. For whoever does not believe in Christ the Son of God promises himself eternal salvation in vain. For he himself, Jesus Christ, who is the truth, says in the holy Gospel: “He who does not believe is already judged, because he does not believe

in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. And again, a little later, he adds, saying: “He who believes in the Son has eternal life; but he who is unbelieving toward the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon him.” Saint [Christophylus?] also says: “Without faith it is impossible to please God.”

The solution of the proposed question is now clear to all who truly believe in Christ: that through him, the Savior of the world, there is salvation, and whoever does not believe in him cannot be saved. Nor is it permitted for a Christian in any way to pass beyond the bounds of his religion, so as to presume to explain this question otherwise than Christ taught. But whoever departs from this rule of faith by bringing forward the contrary plainly shows that he does not think rightly concerning Christ, the Savior of the faithful. For whoever promises salvation to anyone outside Christ wishes to declare Christ a liar. But we, confirmed by the most sacred ordinances of the Gospel, firmly and indubitably believe and declare that no one outside the faith of Christ can be saved, however much he worships one God, however holy or just a life he lives, however much he trusts in his paternal or other religion. Christ is salvation, and outside the Christian faith no one will be saved. For why did Christ, the Son of God, wish to die for the sins of the world, if each person could have been saved outside faith in him, in his own paternal tradition? From the beginning of the world, after the fall of the human race, it was impossible for anyone to be saved unto eternal life otherwise than in the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, he says.

For what of the fact that the greater part of mankind remains outside the faith of Jesus today? Did not the Savior of the world himself long ago foretell in the holy Gospel that many are called, but few chosen? And again he says: “Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and spacious is the way that leads to perdition, and many are they who enter through it.” What, we ask, can our salvation contribute to God, who has no need of our goods? For whether many are saved, God himself is the immutable Lord of all; nothing is added to him if all are saved, nothing is lacking if the whole world perishes.

The order of divine providence and majesty is infallible; it embraces those who are to be damned no less than those who are to be saved, each and all. Certainly no one of the damned suffers injury, since, just as in the first man we all fell, so no one is saved except in the blood of Jesus Christ through mercy, and no one is damned except in his own unbelief and by desert through justice.

From what has been set forth, another question of no small difficulty arises, which the curiosity of men is accustomed to raise against those who think rightly concerning the faith of Christ: Why does almighty God, since he is just and merciful, not cease to create so many thousands of men whom he most certainly foreknew were to be damned? Why does he not spare the wretched, and refrain from bringing forth into destruction in such a multitude those whom he foreknew would turn aside to evil? For it would seem better not to be than to be evilly. To this question let him answer who thinks himself God’s counsellor. Who am I, that I should explain the cause of the divine will? For all things whatsoever the Lord willed, he made in heaven and on earth; there is no one who can resist his will. Hence a certain wise man says to God: “Who will charge it to you if the nations that you made perish?” The almighty has established for things an order of alternation, which he will never revoke by any fullness of change. For just as he permits his sun to rise upon the good and the evil, so until the end of the world he allows men to be conceived, born, and grow, the pious and the impious. The thoughts of men are not in God, nor does he change his counsel according to time; but since he is immutable and eternal, willing all things together and at once and always, he has from eternity unchangeably preordained them. God speaks once, as Scripture bears witness, and does not add; since whatever he wills, he wills immovably and admits no change. Therefore, that men should be born good and evil, pious and impious, faithful and faithless, sinners and saints, those to be saved and those to be damned, by a most just reason

God permits, who has assigned this order to all things. Nothing is lost to God, who is lord of all, and who holds sovereignty everywhere, strengthened no less over evil than over good men and spirits. Christ Jesus, God from God the Father without time, and man from the Virgin in time, appointed mediator of God and human beings, is himself the one through whom we have access to God. He is the savior of all the faithful; of him he thinks wrongly who rashly grants that anyone can be saved without the Christian faith. The omnipotence of God has regard to the order of things which he established; according to its inviolable sequence of righteousness no one will be saved without faith in Christ: no one who does not believe in the Son of God is justified. Therefore they are moved by vain and utterly foolish piety who think that anyone outside the faith of Christ, in the whole world and in any sect whatever, is to be saved, since this is plainly contrary to his sentence. Let them hear the Savior himself again saying in the Gospel: No one comes to the Father except through me. For I am the way, the truth, and the life. If no one comes to the Father except through the Son, certainly no one will be saved except through him. Who will save the Jew and the pagan, since no one can be saved except through Christ? But Christ will undoubtedly save only those who believe in him with heart, speech, and deed. He will not save the Jew, not the Saracen, not the pagan, who do not believe in him, but despise his teaching, contemn the faith, and, blaspheming his holy name, vilify it all day long. For he himself said in the Gospel: Whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, I too shall be ashamed of him before my Father and his holy angels. Tell me now, you who worship Christ and contend that someone can be saved outside the Christian faith in his own sect, which he thinks true: do you believe the Gospel of Christ to be true or false? If true, why do you think the contrary of it? For Christ says: He who has not believed in the Son of God, the wrath of God remains upon him; and he has already been judged and will be condemned; and that no one comes to the Father except through me. But you, seduced by I know not what rashness, force in the contrary, saying that a man outside the faith of Christ, trusting in his ancestral religion, which he believes to be true and pleasing to God, or living innocently according to the law of nature, and especially since perhaps he has never heard anything of the faith of Christ, is to be saved in his confidence. Christ did not say this, but: He who has believed in the only-begotten Son of God will be saved; but he who has not [unclear]. He excepted no one; he admitted no condition, since he who had come to suffer for all had provided for the salvation of all through faith alone. If faith in the Savior is lacking, then no confidence will save the unbeliever. For the holy prelate Augustine said in On Faith to Peter: Hold most firmly, and in no way doubt, that not only all pagans, but also all Jews, heretics, and schismatics who end this present life outside the catholic Church will go into the eternal fire, which has been prepared for the devil and his angels. You see now where foolish compassion draws you: you who measure God by human laws, so that you may make him merciful in all things, do not fear to judge his only-begotten Son, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, a liar. But Christ is truthful, who says that those who do not believe in him are to be damned; you, however, are rash and liars, because you trust that someone can be saved outside his faith. Whoever truly believes in Christ does not permit anyone at all outside the unity of the catholic Church of Christians to be said to be saved. Who says the contrary? For this is the inviolable sentence of catholic tradition, which the Lord Jesus himself, the Son of God, defined in the holy Gospel: namely, that no one is to be saved outside his faith, which he himself instituted, taught, and confirmed by his own blood. Whoever, therefore, [maintains] that a man is to be saved in any sect whatever outside the faith of Jesus

has affirmed [unclear] of Christ, or has believed it in his heart, is not a good Christian, but rather an apostate and a disciple of Antichrist; and unless he comes to his senses, let him know that he is to be tormented forever in hell with him. For he is an Antichrist, not a Christian, who says that one who does not believe in the Lord Jesus is to be saved without the Savior. Therefore, most wise Caesar, let no one appear in the sight of your majesty, let no one feel that you adheres to him, who thinks that men are to be saved outside the faith of Jesus Christ. For everyone who has believed that anyone is to be saved outside the faith of Christ has denied both Christ and his Gospel. But when we say that all who are not Christians are to be damned, this is a sign not of cruelty but of true piety. For it is better to believe firmly in the truth than to assent falsely to a man. That all Jews, pagans, gentiles, Saracens, schismatics, heretics, and unbelievers are without doubt to be damned eternally with the demons is attested by the holy Church, which took and confirmed this judgment from no other source than from the words of Christ. For thus he said: “He who believes in the Son has eternal life,” by which the faith and work of a good Christian are signified. “But he who is unbelieving toward the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon him.” Here are designated all Jews, pagans, Saracens, gentiles, and all who do not believe in our Lord Jesus Christ. Concerning schismatics and heretics, however, the judgment of Christ is manifest in the Gospel, where he says: “If he refuses to hear the Church, let him be to you as a heathen and a publican.” Heathens are gentiles; publicans are manifest and public sinners, of whose damnation the most certain holy Church does not doubt. For who among Christians would doubt that gentiles and monstrous sinners, and manifest ones, are to be damned? Since, therefore, all schismatics and heretics despise the holy Church, they are most rightly said to be like the gentiles and publicans who are to be damned for their crimes and deserts, and they will justly undergo with them equal punishments of everlasting damnation.

Behold those whom the just sentence of Christ the Savior has damned: does the foolish commiseration of men, not to say impious cruelty, presume that they are to be saved? They desire to be merciful toward lost men, and do not fear to show themselves cruel toward God. Those whom he by justice has assigned to death, they assert, with the worst presumption, are to be recalled to life. It is not good or useful for a Christian, whether in earnest or in jest, to contradict Christ. He is impious, not a Christian, whoever says that unbelievers are to be saved. When Adam, the first man, perished, we all sinned, and the wrath of God remained upon the whole human race from the beginning of the world until Christ. Christ came, born of a virgin; being God and man, innocent of sin, he voluntarily underwent the death of the cross, and, having become mediator between God and man, removed the wrath of original guilt from those who believe in him. For thus he says: “He who believes in the only-begotten Son of God has eternal life. But he who is unbelieving toward the Son shall not see life; rather, the wrath of God remains upon him.” Indeed, without faith in Jesus Christ no one will be saved, however justly and holily he may seem to live in his own religion. For almighty God can save a believer without material baptism, but he cannot make safe one who denies the faith without faith. No one is saved unwillingly, because no one believes unless willingly. For the Lord knows who are his, since he saves those who believe in the Son through repentance, but condemns unbelievers by the equity of justice.

Hence, while these matters were enclosed, a new question struck the mind. What is to be thought about the infants and fools of unbelieving pagans and Jews? To this one must answer briefly. Just as the infants of Christians, baptized in the faith of their parents, are saved, so the unbaptized children of all unbelievers will be damned in the perfidy of their parents. The judgment concerning fools of either religion is similar: just as we believe without doubt that baptized fools of Christians are to be saved, so we should say without doubt that those of unbelievers are to be damned.

Again here he asks what, according to Catholic doctrine, is to be thought about those people who inhabit the newly discovered islands in the great sea, of which no mention is made among the cosmographers, and who, as we have been informed, have never heard anything at all of the Christian religion. A brief answer is given, conforming in all things to what has been written before: Truth has utterly excepted no one who does not believe from damnation: not an islander, not one contiguous with our world, not anyone else, whether dwelling near or far away; but indifferently and without limitation of persons he concluded, saying: “He who believes and has been baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned,” and the wrath of God remains upon him. Who removes the wrath of God from man, except our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the mediator between God and men? By what means, except through faith formed in him who, innocent, tasted death? Since, therefore, no one is saved without faith, we cannot promise salvation to those ignorant of Christ, who, it is agreed, do not have the piety of faith in him. Necessarily, therefore, we shall say that all are damned who do not believe in the Son of God, whether they have heard of him or are wholly ignorant of him. Yet we grant one thing: that if any among those who are ignorant of Christ have lived well according to the law of nature, invoking one God, even if they have sometimes sinned, provided they had done penance before death, they have been, or are to be, less gravely damned than those who either, hearing of Christ, despise him, or among either group have lived wickedly and foully. For God is just; he does wrong to no one, but renders to each according to his works. But the wrath of God remains upon all who do not believe in his only-begotten Son, because of the original sin of the first man, from which no one is justified except through faith and the baptism of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. But if original sin has been alone in a person, as in little children, unless it is removed through Christ it condemns the one who has it only to the penalty of loss, by which, namely, he is shut out forever from the vision of God and the enjoyment of the happiness of the saints. But an adult who sins mortally will be punished after death with a double penalty, namely of loss and of sense, so that he both does not see God and, feeling the pains of the fire of Gehenna without end, never escapes them. But Jews and Saracens, and all the rest who, hearing the faith of Christ, despise it, are without doubt damned to both penalties, of loss and of sense, whether otherwise they live innocently according to the law of nature or the contrary. Yet among those who have never had any hearing of Christ, if any should live innocently according to the law of nature until death, I do not think they have furnished cause for it to be said or believed that they are to be damned to the penalty [of sense?], although they are deprived forever of the vision of God, which theologians have called [the penalty of] the damned. For no one will behold the face of God the Father almighty unless he has been reborn through faith in Christ. ¶ Now let us bring judgment against those who, when we assert these things to them in Catholic fashion according to Christ’s doctrine, object with foolish reflection: Why did God, since he is supremely good, wish to create so many thousands of men, whom he foreknew from eternity were to be damned? For if a comparison of Christians is made with unbelievers, scarcely a twentieth part of the people of the whole world today believes in our Lord Jesus Christ. The boundless curiosity of this question has often struck many; if their faith in Christ were firm and devotion in them fervent with love, they would not ask things so unusual and difficult. For who is found among mortals with such honor of doctrine or holiness that, apart from God himself, he might disclose to us the cause of the divine will? The will of God is incomprehensible, because he himself is the cause of his most righteous will. The everlasting order is inviolable; and, as I said above, God does wrong to no one. When God judged the universal flood upon the earth, were not only eight people saved in the ark, while all the rest perished by the inundation of the waters? The cause of their being struck down was sin. That they were created, there was no other cause than the uncircumscribable goodness of God. That few are saved while many perish, a figure preceded the mystery: and Noah’s ark [was] of the Christian faith

sacrament. For indeed, just as outside Noah's ark all perished in the flood, so now all who are outside the unity of the catholic Church of Christians, without doubt, are eternally in their sins, Jews as well as pagans, heretics likewise and schismatics. The justice of God condemns those whom his goodness created. But mercy saves those whom grace has confirmed; for, as the holy Apostle says, it is not of him who wills nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy; since he has mercy on whom he wills, and whom he wills he hardens. Rightly weighing the freedom of human choice, we shall know also the just will of God.

On The Miracles Of Unbelievers. Third Question.

The third question of your most serene majesty was: If no one is saved outside the faith, whence come miracles among unbelievers, since we know from the report of many that astonishing things occur even among unbelievers?

The solution of this question, as it seems to me, will not be difficult, if we give faith to the Scriptures and apply the necessary consideration to the natural powers of the soul. A miracle is a new and unusual event, which occurs contrary to custom and draws human beings into wonder. Hence good Christians [perform them] in one way; bad Christians in another, [unclear] in public justice; servants, truly, through signs of public justice; but unbelievers through private contracts with demons, namely implicit or explicit. Concerning the good, indeed, the Lord said in the holy Gospel: These signs shall follow those who believe. In my name they shall cast out demons; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not harm them. They shall lay hands upon the sick, and they shall be well.

Concerning bad Christians, however, who perform miracles in the name of Jesus Christ, we read thus written in the Gospel: Many will say to me on that day: Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in your name, and in your name cast out demons, and in your name done many mighty works? And then I shall declare to them that I never knew you: depart from me, all you who work iniquity. But outside the Church of God, where the name of our Lord Jesus Christ is not invoked, if any marvels are done beyond the custom of nature or human art, no good Christian doubts that they are done by the cooperation of demons. And works of this sort your Caesarean Serenity, by discernment of power, judges should rather be called marvels than miracles. Nor does this judgment depart from the reason of truth, insofar as there should be a necessary distinction between the prodigies of light and of darkness.

I find four agents of wondrous things, but I recognize one alone, God, who truly works miracles, chiefly as the cause of all good things. Therefore the first and greatest agent of all marvels is God, who, filling the whole world with signs, miracles, and mighty works, has illuminated it; to him none of the rest is to be compared. He created heaven and earth, the sea and all things that are in them; he alone is omnipotent, just, holy, and upright; good, incomprehensible, greatest, glorious, immeasurable, and everlasting. Let all other things be beneath him, for whatever can happen wondrously in this world is certainly less than the whole world itself, which he was able to create from nothing. Every miracle, too, that can be done through a human being is less than the human being himself, whom God, the creator of all things, formed from the beginning in his own image and likeness. And although the visible miracles of God among mortals, through the constant habit of seeing natural things, now almost lose their value, nevertheless, if we behold them wisely, they will appear greater and rarer than all unusual things. But the mode in which God works miracles is the unchangeable will of God, which, since it is omnipotent, does all things whatsoever he has willed in heaven and on earth. For he spoke and

are: he himself commanded, and they were created. The will of God is ordered and everlasting; therefore his miracles are incomparably greater than the others. For greater than all the miracles of this world is what we behold, the whole universe, and whatever is contained in it, created by the will of God. The unchangeable divine will works all things, enduring, and lacking both beginning and end; but whatever God wills, he always wills, because, since with him willing and being able are the same, it does not belong to the unchangeable one to labor. Hence all the universal miracles that the Creator of all things performs he has presented for good and evil people to behold; and after the general things which by now have become cheapened among mortals through use, in almost every single creature he has also shown infinite things specially worthy of wonder.

The second performer of miracles is the good angel, who very often works wonders for mortals both by natural power and by divine power. For those most blessed spirits are sent by divine ordinance in ministry to the faithful; to good and evil people they furnish those things that are benefits of nature, but only to those believing in God our Lord Jesus Christ do they administer the gifts of saving grace. Hence there is no doubt that those miracles which are done in the Church of the saints by invocation of the divine name are displayed by their ministry and cooperation. But the wonders of unbelievers, if any are done today or are read to have been done formerly, are either fabricated or falsely reported, or are accomplished by the mockery of demons. For it cannot happen that unbelievers perform any miracles by the ministry of good angels, since where Christ Jesus, the Son of God, is not believed, no signs of grace are displayed by good spirits to impious and reprobate men. Indeed, since they are obstinate in the error of a false religion, if in their own estimation they have obtained any miracle, there is no reason whatever to doubt that it is done through the ministry of demons. For since they are wholly unlike the good angels, they attain no familiarity with them. No despiser of the Christian faith can please God; but whoever is shown to displease almighty God is without doubt deprived of the familiarity of the holy angels. Yet through this I do not withdraw the claim that every man has been entrusted to some good spirit, by whose ministry, even if he is unbelieving toward the Son of God, he may receive the benefits of nature, though he may not reach the gifts of grace. But to those who believe in our Lord Jesus Christ they confer not only the benefits of nature, but also administer the gifts of grace. It is therefore manifest that, if any miracles are done among unbelievers, they cannot be done by the gift of God or by the ministry of the holy angels, since all are placed outside the unity of the Church, and signs cannot be worked by the impious through public righteousness. For God, as has been said, does not remove his original wrath from man except through faith in Jesus Christ; but everyone who is unbelieving toward the Son of God will not see eternal life, but the wrath of God remains upon him. Therefore everyone upon whom the wrath of God remains will not be able to please him; and so if any wondrous things are done at his prayers, they should be believed to have been performed not by the power of God nor by the ministry of angels, but rather by the substitution of demons.

The third performer of wonders is the devil, who, like an ape, is eager to imitate whatever he has seen, and deceives the minds of men, especially unbelievers, with various illusions; and [unclear] by a certain likeness of miracles those believing in him [unclear] to be able to seduce men, whom it is agreed were created by nature subtler than all mortals. They cannot know the thoughts of mortals except by a certain conjecture, when, that is, our inward things are manifest by certain signs. Demons foretell future things, and sometimes they say true things; sometimes, making conjectures, they are deceived and deceive. From the beginning of the world they have known certain signs preceding events; by experience and use of these they sometimes foretell as true what is going to happen, since, when they have seen signs known to themselves preceding a thing, they immediately conjecture what is in a man's thought. Yet more often they deceive, because they themselves too are deceived. For when concerning some

they are asked about a matter which they do not know: for example, whether a messenger sent far away will return soon, or on what day. Immediately, in the blink of an eye, they arrive at the place where they know him to be; and when they have seen that he has already begun the journey of return, they carefully count the stages, and, suddenly returned to the questioner, affirm that the absent man will come on a certain day. But if he has either delayed on the road or turned aside elsewhere, then certainly the demons, deceived in their own judgment, must be mistaken.

They gladly involve themselves in prophecies, and are quite eager to foretell future things to human beings for the sake of honor and esteem, since they greatly desire to be held worthy of admiration. They seek divine honors, and greatly desire to be feared by mortals. Just as boys, hiding in secret or running about masked, suddenly burst out from their hiding places and shake their companions, who suspect no such thing, with unexpected terror, and then hide themselves again lest they be recognized; when they see the unsuspecting ones terrified, they boast as if they had obtained some great honor from this. Following the example of these, certain demons, more bound to the earth and very restless, who move about among men, whom the ancients called [Bacucei?], terrify human beings at night; and they seek nothing more from mortals than the reputation of divinity. Hence also, before those with whom they are permitted to be by reason of likeness, they sometimes perform various tricks, and present themselves as terrifying in people’s minds as occasion permits. Whenever they can, they gladly clothe themselves in the likeness of a human body; but they do not always find suitable material of air with which to be clothed. For this reason they more often appear monstrous and horrible, because they have not had suitable humors or vapors for the perfection of the appearance they desired. The more, however, they are fastened to earthly dwellings, the more, by that circumstance, they have been made dull in relation to matter. Hence, because of the ignorance which they contracted through disobedience, the predictions of demons are frequently false, although by divine permission they are sometimes even verified.

For, as that most holy John Chrysostom says, it is sometimes granted to the devil to speak the truth, so that he may recommend his lie by rare truth; because if he never spoke the truth, he could deceive no one, and his seduction would by no means suffice for tempting. It is therefore not astonishing if demons sometimes seem to foretell true things to unbelieving human beings, since they once could offer prophecies to the gentiles in idols. Nor is it astonishing if they sometimes provide care for the sick, since they know the natures of all herbs and can very easily apply them to the ill, and either remove diseases which they had previously inflicted, or for a time withdraw from the senses those which chance has inflicted. For almighty God, by the right of imperial majesty over all things, uses even the ministry of demons both for the testing of the faithful and for the punishment of the impious. Since they are perverse in affection, obstinate in their rebellion, and proud, they greatly desire divine esteem and honors; and therefore they gladly answer the invocations of unbelievers which they are accustomed to pour out to the gods, as if they themselves were gods. Among unbelievers they sometimes seem to raise the dead to life, and they show marvelous things to curious people, so that, as if confirmed by miracles, they may render them altogether obstinate in their former error. Yet they do not truly raise the dead, but deceive the senses of human beings in various ways: for either they themselves enter the corpses of the dead and carry them about for a time as if alive, or, after those bodies have been taken away to a more remote place, they display to the spectators some image in the appearance of the person who has departed life, as the experience of certain people has informed us. We believe it manifest that demons can show, in a certain false likeness, all the things whatsoever that the saints do as miracles in truth. All the miracles of demons are either phantasms, or things done by a certain natural skill. For if human beings experienced in the more hidden mysteries of nature, by an application of matter to form which is concealed from others, produce unusual and marvelous effects, such as naturally forming eels from the dew of heaven, bees from calf’s flesh, serpents from certain roots of herbs, and many things like these, not to speak of greater ones, as experiment has made us experienced in very many cases, who would deny that demons, being of subtler nature and greater experience, can naturally work more marvelous things which are manifest to no human being?

The fourth worker of miracles, however, is man, who works marvelous things in four ways, which to those who know neither the cause nor the manner do not seem human. And first, indeed, by invocation of the divine name, when, in faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the merit of accepted holiness concurs. In this way indeed the holy apo-

[apostles?] and their imitators, by the power of God and likewise by the merit of holiness, wrought miracles in the unity of faith. But in this way unbelievers cannot work miracles, for they do not walk the necessary path of faith unto salvation. For even if many of them believe in one God, nevertheless, because they refuse to believe in the mediator between God and men, they have gone very far away from the mercy of God.

But, as the holy Gospel promises, all things are possible for those who believe in God and our Lord Jesus Christ, that is, for those who also adorn right faith with holy works. For indeed, just as without faith it is impossible to please God, so also faith without works is dead. For almighty God would grant us all the things that we ask in the faith of Christ, if we did all things according to the faith that we owe. Believe firmly and act faithfully, and you will always obtain all things.

Second, a man works miracles by likeness to angelic purity. For the purer our mind becomes in love, confirmed in the faith of Jesus Christ, so much the more, made like to the holy angels, does it attain greater familiarity with them. Whoever, however, has attained complete familiarity with the holy angels, when he wishes, by God’s bounty, he will shine forth in miracles. For the holy angels reveal to pure men, and to those fervent in the love of God, secrets hidden from others, and by command of the Creator they make many things manifest to them. For the Lord is near to those who call upon him in truth. The Lord will do the will of those who fear him; and he will hear their prayers and save them. For whoever through grace is one with Christ is refreshed by the frequent visitation of angels; and, as often as necessity requires it, he is made illustrious by signs and powers through their ministry.

Hence it is that those also who are weighed down by various illnesses betake themselves to the intercessions of the saints; and, calling to mind the promises of the Lord, they obtain by another’s merits what they cannot obtain by their own. Their holy devotion in the faith of Christ receives salvation from the Lord; for, aided by the purity of its own conscience and supported by the merit of another’s holiness, it rises, not rashly, into sure hope.

Miracles, however, occur in the Church of God by divine power with a threefold regard or means. For sometimes almighty God works a miracle by the ministry of angels, solely by the merits of the worker himself, as Saint Martin healed a blind man and a lame man against their will. Sometimes miracles occur by the merit of the sufferer alone, as we read that many were cured through bad Christians whom the sick believed to be very good in the faith. Third, that healings of this kind occur by the merits of both is to be held, since Christ says to a certain person in the holy Gospel: If you can believe, all things are possible to the believer. For faith is always required for a miracle, so that our Lord Jesus Christ, coming into his own country, wondered that he could not do any mighty work there because of their unbelief. But none of these things is done among unbelievers, where neither holiness in the worker nor orthodox faith in the sufferer is found.

Third, therefore, a man works miracles through the intervening cooperation of diabolical depravity; and this can happen in three ways, namely by manifest involvement and supposition in the invocation of demons,

Through manifest invocation necromancers and the petty women whom we commonly call witches do wondrous things; they, corrupted by a likeness of will, have passed into the fellowship of demons. For just as in the Church of God the sacraments are signs of the invisible grace of the Holy Spirit, so in the school of demons certain characters and modes of invocation are marks of a pact between a man and an evil spirit. Hence, when witches display the signs of demons, the invoked evil spirits have readily been accustomed to come to them and to show forth dreadful acts of witchcraft and at the same time certain wondrous things. But witches and necromancers produce wondrous effects by invocation of demons in different ways. Witches subject themselves to demons by a certain kind of profession; by their ministry they trouble the air, darken storms, ravage crops, and make men and beasts sick. They carry on with demons the foul commerce of most filthy pleasure; by pernicious charms they call back from below, into sight, whomever they wish. The deeds of these women should not be called miracles, but rather acts of witchcraft, deservedly to be punished with the severest penalty. Necromancers, however, subject themselves to demons not by a manifest profession but by an implicit condition, when they promise to compel them to become visible in a circle, not only by conjurations and the display of characters, but also by sacrifices, fumigations, and vows. Their crimes are without number. Since, whether implicitly or explicitly, they are made partners in the fellowship [unclear], or are equal in deed, yet all are in agreement, to their own destruction, in damnable curiosity, by which they desire, with the aid of demons, to attain what they cannot discover naturally. All their works and volumes, full of superstitions and impiety, must be destroyed.

There is in the East a great multitude of enchanters and necromancers, who by their tricks miserably deceive human beings and long ago turned almost the whole of Asia Major and Asia Minor away from the faith of Christ. Tricks can be performed in three ways: by the ministry of demons, by the operation of nature, and by the deception of human art. No true Christian will doubt that the miracles of unbelievers are performed in one of these ways, once the determinate root of the agent is established. But today there are many among Christians who are devoted to the works of demons: enchanters, witches, reprobates concerning the faith, who deceive many people by excessive curiosity and promise impossibilities by their arts.

But by the implication of demons wondrous things are sometimes done; namely, whenever a man not sufficiently and rightly grounded in the faith desires or wishes for something otherwise than befits a Christian, even if he believes it to be no sin; and although this ought not to happen, nevertheless the devil, inserting himself, very often supplies the desired effect. Such is that practice which sufferers from spasms commonly use. On the sacred day of Parasceve they fashion a ring of any metal during the office, and afterwards they always wear it on the ring finger. These things are utterly vain and have no root of truth at all. Yet I cannot deny that I have seen certain people cured of spasm by that same vanity. Likewise, I know that certain men have opened very strong locks with words and herbs; I do not think this was done either by the power of God or by the violence of the things applied. I could bring forward countless similar things which I have seen and heard: what else are their manifest effects but certain miracles? Finally, there are some exceedingly curious people who, by persistently placing faith and confidence in characters, little slips, rings, figures, necklaces, and unknown words, often obtain wondrous effects. We by no means doubt that the devil has supplied these, not on account of the merit of holiness nor by the mercy granted by God, but rather through faithless credulity. For demons, having the greatest envy of the human race, in order to destroy the souls of mortals, gladly come to vain [unclear].

in the operations of the impious. For what else are characters and interpretations of hidden names than certain foods and drinks for demons? Whoever puts faith in characters that promise marvelous effects has implicitly denied both the faith of Christ and the church of the saints. Alas, how many Christians today, how many clerics, how many priests, to say nothing of greater persons, make use of many and various superstitions in their daily actions; by these they follow compacts with demons that are bound up in them, to the insult of the Christian faith and to their own condemnation. And because these evils have now been multiplied too greatly among Christians, the Almighty has withdrawn his hand and handed them over into the power of the faithless, so that they may feel as exactors of punishments those in imitation of whom they were stubbornly serving, not the living and true God, but empty superstitions.

But that marvelous things are done by the substitution of demons we plainly recognize, if we inquire more carefully into the truth. For Jews, Saracens, pagans, or gentiles, who do not believe in our God Jesus Christ, if they perform any miracles, are believed to have done them not by the power of God, not by the ministry of angels, not by the merit of holiness, but by the substitution of demons. For as often as they invoke almighty God, in whose only-begotten Son they do not believe, for the mercy of some marvelous effect, the devil, knowing that there is no salvation for sinners and that the Most High does not hear unbelieving sinners, in order to keep them obstinate in their errors, secretly applies himself in place of the invoked God, and, if he can, with the Lord permitting it, grants to those praying what is requested. The devil uses this substitution all the more freely, the less he is hindered by the faith of Christ and the sacraments of the Church. For the wrath of God remains upon all unbelievers who do not believe in his only-begotten Son; and they are in the power of the devil, and therefore, when invoked, he enters in place of God. Hence, blinded in their errors, they invoke God, in whose Son they do not believe; and when he, holding them in wrath, scorns to hear them, the devil, a false worker of wonders, comes near. Therefore they believe the mockeries of the devil, they who disdain to believe the true miracles of God. From demons they receive false miracles suited to their errors, who by believing were unwilling to follow the truth, that is, Christ. For there are many among the unbelievers who, worshiping one God, the creator of all things, do not adore idols, and firmly believe that they will be saved in their own faith. But because they disdain to believe the mystery of the Lord’s incarnation, the wrath of God remains upon them, and they vanish away in their foolishness. Thinking God to be near to them, though they do not believe rightly in him, they are made subject to demons; and, putting faith in their false miracles, they are confirmed in their errors by falsehood.

It may not be tiresome to have introduced a likeness of this matter, O Caesar. There was a certain swineherd who had enclosed in a stick a small sheet containing the name of the holy martyr Blaise; he placed such faith in it that he believed that, if the staff were fixed in the ground in the middle of the herd, every wolf would be prevented from approaching. This foolish confidence, at last strengthened by long experience, made the man go safely wherever he wished, leaving the pigs in the wood without danger, since no wolf now had any access to a pig. It happened that [unclear] passed by, while the shepherd was absent and watching [unclear]; seeing a demon keeping guard over the herd, he said to him: “What are you doing here, wretched one?” He replied: “I am guarding these pigs.” But he said: “Who entrusted the care of pigs to you?” “The foolish confidence of the shepherd. For he enclosed a certain small sheet in a stick, thinking it to be of great piety and virtue, that by the merits of some Blaise it may keep wolves away from the pigs; he has sinned against his own law and follows our vanities. But because the one invoked does not appear, I, lest this man lose his confidence, guard his pigs for him; and I willingly substitute myself for Blaise. Thus ungrateful mortals harass us with vain conjurations, so that unless we wish to lose all estimation and honor among them, we must, I confess, often come in answer to their foolish invocations.” By the likeness of this deed, merciful [unclear], demons deceive unbelievers; and the miracles which they ask of God in prayer they often obtain by the substitution of malignant spirits. For in those things which concern either the worship or the honor of God, demons gladly insert themselves; and those who cannot obtain manifest honors are indeed delighted by hidden ones.

At the same time it must be noted that from the beginning of the world no religion or sect of principal excellence has ever lacked miracles, although not all were done from one source. For whatever miracles have been done in true religion have been done from no other source than God. For the law of nature had its miracles; the written law had them; and grace now likewise has them. The almighty God who gave religion also himself works miracles. But in false religions truth is not worshiped; if any miracles are done, it is not God but the devil who works them. For since God is truth, he did not institute false religions, and therefore he has never illuminated falsehood with his miracles. Muhammad

who, full of an evil demon, established a false religion: he adorned it with false miracles, not from God but by the cooperation of demons. For the demon who gave the cause of the error could also, once the occasion had been taken, display a false miracle to those deceived. Hence, if miracles had been wholly lacking to Mahomet as he was persuading a rude people of a new religion, perhaps no one would have put faith in him. For he too showed such things, both by subtlety of intellect and by the cooperation of the devil, that he seemed to have confirmed certain things by miracles. Miracles were not lacking even to the idolatrous pagans, if we do not deny credence to histories. But the Jews, before the incarnation of the Son of God, receiving his law through Moses, were often made illustrious by divine miracles. Yet after the Lord’s resurrection, when the Mosaic law had been made void, those who do not believe in the only-begotten Son of God remain under the wrath of his indignation; and all miracles of truth have ceased among them. Hence, if they do any wondrous things today, they are works of demons and manifest signs of error. For the demons watch with the greatest zeal so that those men whom they have once made to wander from the way of truth, which is Christ, they may, by a continuation of fraud until death, make stubborn in error. Indeed, when God for just reason withdraws his grace from unbelievers, the malignant deceiver, an unknown spirit, approaches them; and when he sees that they are far removed from salvation, by false miracles he seduces the minds of the ignorant, as though the Lord were near. Therefore whatever miracles belong to unbelievers are works of demons; for just as there is no salvation for mortals outside the unity of the Christian faith, so without Christ the most holy power does not grant wonders. For now the demons, hiding in ambush, long since defeated and confounded by Christ’s trophy, fear to appear openly as they did before the Lord’s incarnation; and therefore among unbelievers they falsely present themselves as good spirits.

There are also some who add to the aforesaid three modes a fourth, saying that the mind or spirit of man himself can naturally do wondrous things, provided it knows how to recall itself from every adventitious thing into itself, above sense, in unity. For those who assert such things promise to do the wonders of nature, to predict future things, to disclose men’s secrets, to remove diseases, and suddenly to change men’s counsels. But that mode of miracles cannot be simply natural, certain, common, and infallible; for if it is true, which I have not experienced, some external power must now necessarily intervene and occupy the thinker in part, whether a good angel or a malignant spirit. But if none of the powers from without mixes itself in, the prophet must necessarily form the beginning of his speaking either from conjectures or from bold presumption, and pronounce a judgment sometimes true, sometimes false. Indeed, as long as the spirit dwells in the body, it understands nothing naturally without the ministry of sense. Hence I would not wholly resist if they grant that our confused and rude intellect is assisted by a like ministry. For we perceive this in those who very often, from an inward love and desire for Jesus, [unclear] of the flesh

... contemplating a mode, they pass beyond: lifted upward from the earth into the air; and we think that they surpass bodily weight not merely by their own keenness of mind, but nevertheless by divine power.

Therefore the three principles of the opinion mentioned, unknown to many, in my judgment suffice in brief: that the mind, placed in the body, by its own power works wondrous effects outside itself. For what? Let anyone ignorant of nature tell me whether bodily weight can be lightened by the operation of the mind. I speak of a thing experienced, with two others bearing witness with me. When as a youth I was pursuing literary studies, four of us were sleeping in one bed one night. There arose [unclear], of the same age as he, and while asleep, as he was accustomed in dreams, he walked around the house with his eyes closed, the full moon shining within, almost as if awake. He climbed walls and surpassed a squirrel in his agility. He also, asleep, crossed the bed a second and a third time; he trod on all of us with his feet, and we felt no greater weight than if a little thing had touched us. Wherever his sleeping body was moved, suddenly all the fastenings of the doors opened of their own accord. He very swiftly penetrated the higher parts of the house, and clung to the roofs like a sparrow. I speak of things seen, not heard by vague report. These seem to be functions of the soul, not of the body; the soul, by its natural power, so to speak, uses itself as though freely, when, the senses of the flesh being bound, it wanders outside the dwelling-place of the body. But since the matter is not in every respect suited to the proposed question, let us put off the treatment of the causes of these marvels to another time. For we do not believe these things wondrous to wise men, who have very well understood the power and nobility of the human mind, since, hindered only by the interposition of the body, in other respects it is judged equal to angels. Finally let us pass over fascinations, and the various modes and kinds, by which a very furious man works effects externally that are very wondrous. The imagination of one who trusts very strongly also has much power for producing wondrous effects, whether it is directed toward a true object or toward one only imagined. Hence, since there are so many modes and kinds of working wonders, it is not to be wondered at if Jews, Saracens, pagans, gentiles, and all other unbelievers established outside the faith of Christ, who cannot perform miracles by public justice, carry out wonders either by the support of demons or by artful industry. Nor does it escape me that, by the same reasoning, the miracles of the saints are attacked by the impious, as if they were not done by the power of the Creator, but rather by the entanglement or substitution of the devil. Whoever truly believes that the Christian faith alone is true does not doubt that all the miracles of unbelievers have been performed by the cooperation of demons. But if anyone rashly and obstinately thinks the contrary, he shows himself to be an unbeliever, not a Christian.

On Sacred Scripture. Fourth Question.

The fourth question of your most serene majesty was this: Why has almighty God not given sacred Scripture, containing the mysteries of our faith of both the New and the Old Testament, open, manifest, and in all things uniform, plain and sufficient for all things, but rather wrapped up, in many places full of enigmas? For many things necessary for the perfection of faith are not found sufficiently expressed in the divine Scriptures. To this most sacred question of your majesty it seems that one must answer: Every Scripture divinely inspired is a perfect work of divinity, ordained before all time, written in time, in no other way than God willed, who inspired men that it should be written. But all the works of God are perfect; and therefore, since the Scripture about which we speak is the work of God, it is necessary to confess it perfect in all things. For the supreme judge, God, whose works are all perfect, willed it, and conferred upon his Scriptures the order that he willed; and without doubt he infused into those who received them the manner in which they should write.

For almighty God has conferred such authority and majesty on Sacred Scripture that, in comparison with it, all the words of this world fail, since divine things cannot properly be grasped in human speech. Divine Scripture, therefore, which on the surface of its words appears confused to the unlearned, seems clear to those who know it; for unless it is read in that Spirit by which it is believed to have been breathed into human beings, one by no means arrives at an understanding of it. The learned man who burns under the covering of the flesh and with vain desires reads it in one way, and the man of understanding, whom the love of God truly inflames when stripped of pleasures, reads it in another. Hence it is no wonder if men who think carnally do not understand the divine Scriptures: blinded by the pleasures of the flesh, they have never perceived the sweetness of the Spirit of God.

Just as, if you show to a boy learning the first elements of letters any written volume whose character is unlike that in his own little book, when he cannot read the writing he will at once cry out that it is bad and not rightly formed. In the same way, when men who are wise only carnally approach the reading of the divine Scriptures, and do not grasp the things that are of the divine Spirit, weighed down by vices and rashness, although they ought to have blamed their own ignorance and unworthiness, they censure as holy writings the Scriptures which they do not understand. For it is not permitted indiscriminately to all to interpret the divine Scriptures, lest the beast that touches the mountain be overwhelmed with stones.

Now there arise, in a disordered order, many who have spent the whole time of their life on the literature of humanity; and, having become older men, by wrongly interpreting the divine Scriptures which they never learned, they do not make them clear but confuse them, and examine them in an improper sense. Hence all who do not understand the sacred Scriptures in the Spirit by which they were breathed into those who wrote them have the veil of ignorance and rashness spread over their hearts, after the manner of the Jews; and from that source they often drink the poison of destructive error, from which those who approach humbly in the Spirit of God have received the cup of salvation.

For heavenly doctrine is not contained in the words of the Scriptures but in the meaning; not on the surface of the utterances, but in the understanding; not in leaves adorned with ornament, but in the hidden place of mystical inspiration. Hence the divine pope Gregory says: “Sacred Scripture surpasses by far all the sciences of this world in its manner of speaking, because in one and the same discourse, while it narrates the text, it brings forth a mystery; and just as it refreshes the simple on the surface, so it exercises the wise in mystery. For it has openly that with which it may nourish little ones, and it keeps hidden that whereby it may suspend the minds of the lofty in admiration of sweetness, like a certain wondrous river in which both the simple and little lamb may walk, and the great elephant may swim.” And Saint Augustine says on Genesis: “Divine Scripture speaks in such a way that by its loftiness it mocks the proud, by its depth it terrifies the attentive, by its power it feeds the great, and by its affability it nourishes the little.”

For the authority of Sacred Scripture is greater than all the keenness of human talent. Therefore, in order that one may arrive at their true understanding, first of all the soul must be cleansed from every carnal affection; the help of divine goodness must be earnestly implored with humility, so that by his own Spirit he may enlighten the understanding of the learner. For the necks of all powers must be bowed beneath the authority of the divine Scriptures; and, as the divine Jerome says, one must never flatter a human being in such a way that the truth of the holy Scriptures is neglected, which, throughout both Testaments, is true in the narration of deeds, right in admonitions, certain in promises, and to be feared terribly in threats.

For this reason it has not been given to all to be able to penetrate the mysteries of the divine Scriptures, but it is permitted only to those to whom both love continues study and the Spirit of God grants true understanding to purified minds. But whoever is filthy with the darkness of vices, whoever walks with a swollen mind

proud: whoever doubts the truth of the Scriptures of God, whether in part or in whole, should never trust that he can arrive at an understanding of them. For the authority of Scripture itself says that unless you believe, you will not understand. It is the slowness of our intellect, and also the [unclear] of our desire, whenever we do not rightly understand the divine Scriptures: namely, when the veil of harmful occupation remains spread over our hearts, which does not permit us to come to true understanding. Hence it happens that we do not understand the sense which the Spirit has infused into the divine Scriptures, but, grasping the bare words of the writers, twist them into another sense. Indeed, if our minds were purged of carnal vices; if, through the continual pursuit of sobriety, the intellect were exercised in the Scriptures; if that faith and reverence were applied to the holy Scriptures which their dignity requires, every diligent person would understand more clearly than daylight that there is nothing confused in the sacred readings, nothing discordant, nothing unsuitable, nothing absurd, or introduced without the most just reason. For all the passages of divine Scripture are full of mystery; whenever something in them seems to have been placed obscurely, it has been done by divine providence, so that the diligent mind may have the necessary exercise of piety, and the faith of the simple may not lose the place of due reverence. Therefore it was not by chance, but by eternal providence, that he willed the holy Scriptures to be obscure in many places, so that they might abound in as many mysteries as senses in which, by the inspiration of the Spirit of God, they are expounded in Catholic fashion by the doctors. For, as holy Augustine says, the obscurity of divine Scripture is useful and very profitable, because it begets many judgments of truth and brings them forth into the light for human beings; for when one person, and another another, draws out this sense or that by expounding it in Catholic fashion, how lofty and profound it is becomes known. Hence let no man, puffed up with secular learning, suppose that he understands sacred Scripture unless he first lays aside the veil of pride and of every disordered concupiscence.

For secular learning is of greater value for exercising the intellect than for illuminating the understanding toward true wisdom. Therefore, without doubt, divine Scripture is both manifest and clear to minds purified through the continual exercise of the fear of God and frequent study in reading; to minds that are filthy and swollen with secular wisdom it seems confused and obscure. Hence he understands the holy Scriptures well and rightly who, with purified affection and frequent in their study, expounds them just as he who wrote did. For if it is read in a spirit other than that by which he is believed to have inspired them to be written, the mind must be altogether shut off from the true understanding. But when we encounter some discordance in them, let us understand that it is only of words, not of senses; and this arises in an ordered way, not by chance, but by the providence of God, so that the mind, exercised longer in the Scriptures lest it become wholly sluggish, may be strengthened. For the counsel of God cannot be deceived; but the divine Scriptures were written by the counsel of his will; it follows necessarily that they are true and in no way false. They were human beings by whom the divine writings were handed down to us; certainly they wrote words used according to human custom, by which they might signify to posterity what that highest excellence of divinity willed to be known to mortals. Therefore now, you who, devoted to secular wisdom, attack the divine Scriptures, say: the Scripture of the New and Old Testament, which the Church has received and venerates as true, authoritative, and holy Scripture of Christians, from where do you believe it was received? From God, or from human beings? If from God, why do you not believe it? For everyone who attacks Scripture which he believes to have been inspired by God most plainly resists the divine ordinance. But if it is from human beings, why do you hope for the eternal salvation promised in it, which man cannot give? Unless perhaps you madmen go on to say that all things are inventions, and that nothing remains after the fates but ashes, and that the mind undergoes destruction together with the body; such a profession would show you to be no less insane than foolish. For if you truly believe in our Lord Jesus Christ, the only-begotten Son of God, you will necessarily say that the divine Scriptures were inspired by the Holy Spirit. But if, having fallen with apostates into a reprobate sense, you say that they were fabricated by human beings, you impiously show how far you are from true wisdom, wandering in darkness. You plainly show yourselves to be ignorant and rash judges, since you condemn Scripture which you do not understand. But because it is more familiar to you to despise wisdom than to learn it, it is not the purpose of this work to weary the mind any longer against the rashness of the ignorant. I want you to know this one thing: that no one understands except the one who receives; but because you put the filth of your affections in the way, so that you do not receive, therefore the understanding of true wisdom is not possessed.

for God, the illuminator, deigns by grace to be present to those who, stripped of carnal desires, burn with the fire of inward love, who desire nothing in this world except God. To them the Spirit of God brings help by his presence; those whom he has found rooted in the love of truth, purged of every extraneous thing, he leads into the knowledge of all things. For truly, to those who love God all things are open, all things naked, all things manifest, since whoever through love beholds in the faith of Jesus Christ the one who creates and governs all things knows everything that is necessary for his salvation. But, on the contrary, the illumination of God dwells very far from the slothful, wicked feasters, the envious, the greedy, incubi, the foul, the lustful, murderers, the impious and proud, those alien to piety; it leaves them to the judgment of the avenging demon, who, driving in the sharp point of savage fire, afflicts the senses and the mind, and all the more arms and drives the impious to perpetrate crimes, so that, guilty of a more shameful fault, they may also become liable to a more bitter punishment. Hence those entangled in worldly vices and desires are not only unable to penetrate the divine Scriptures with understanding, but, neglecting themselves, do not even know themselves.

Since, therefore, sacred Scripture is the perfect work of God, Caesar, we must so establish our mind that we believe it to be true, right, complete, solid, divinely inspired, and most abundantly sufficient for all who understand it for the confirmation of the Christian faith. For indeed, unless divine Scripture is believed to be true, holy, perfect in all respects, and complete, the Christian faith would be deprived of its foundation. Therefore every Christian must take the greatest care not to overstep the bounds of piety by examining the divine Scriptures more than is fitting, because the author of the Scriptures is not man but the Holy Spirit; and whoever resists the integrity of the Scriptures of God is proved to resist his ordering. Scripture, moreover, by God’s ordinance, is usefully interwoven in its text of figures with parables, riddles, likenesses, and comparisons, so that readers may be exercised toward understanding, and, once its inward sweetness has been tasted, the mind may be strengthened toward piety. And so, if with purified minds we attend to the sense of the Scriptures, not the words, we shall understand how rightly and properly all things have been ordered. For it was not fitting that the sacred Scriptures, in which the knowledge of the divine majesty is handed down, should be so plain and manifest that they would everywhere be understood by all; for this knowledge is set forth to be understood only by the good and holy, not also by evil, foul, and polluted minds. Hence it is written: The beast that touches the mountain shall be overwhelmed with stones. What is designated here by the beast, if not human beings who, in imitation of brute animals, live without the love of God in the pleasures of the flesh? And what is expressed by the mountain, if not the loftiness of the divine Scriptures? When it approaches this holy mountain, the beast is overwhelmed with stones, because a man impure in mind and weak concerning the faith, who without a teaching master attempts to search out the loftiness of the divine Scriptures, is [unclear], as it were, by the stones of various and pernicious errors

is wounded by blows. For just as all things are clean to the clean, so all things seem profane to the profane. God therefore placed his hiding-place in the height of the Scriptures, which is so inaccessible and closed to the reprobate that nevertheless it lies plainly open to the saints.

But why God did not give Holy Scripture sufficient and manifest for all things that concern the Christian faith, we answer briefly. There are two things which the Most High provided for believers for the confirmation of the Christian faith: namely the Church and Scripture, so that what is not expressed clearly enough in the one may be more fully declared by the other. Hence, if we find anything in the Holy Scriptures concerning the rules of faith expressed less sufficiently, at once we have recourse to the Church; where the Church has need of saving instruction for piety, it immediately betakes itself to Scripture. From this it follows that neither would the Church have authority without Scripture, nor Scripture credibility without the Church, so that the judgment of the two may become one. For Augustine says: I would not believe the Gospel unless the authority of the Church compelled me. But John Gerson says: I would not believe the Church unless the Gospel compelled me. The Church confirms Holy Scripture, and is itself confirmed in like manner by Scripture. The Church supplies whenever Scripture is lacking; and if at any time the Church is in doubt, it has recourse to the counsel of Scripture. For there is one Holy Spirit of God, who founded the Church in the faith of Jesus Christ; the very same Almighty one alone inspired Scripture. And this is the threefold cord which is not easily broken, where divine Scripture is joined through the Holy Spirit to the authority of the Church, to such a degree that the Church commends Scripture, and Scripture in turn commends the Church. Therefore, O Caesar, as it seems to me, we have assigned a sufficient cause, for the proposed question, of unconquered majesty: since if all things in the Holy Scriptures that concern the piety of faith were manifestly expressed, holy mother Church would not seem to be of such great authority, and the merit of saving obedience would in large part be emptied out.

At the same time I think sufficient answer has been given to the principal question, where certain persons suppose Holy Scripture in very many places to be confused and imperfect; yet if they approached it with due purity of mind, they would certainly find it perfect and sound. Great is the authority of the Catholic Church, which alone, in doubtful matters concerning the faith, has the right to interpret the Scriptures; to it the necks of all powers must be subjected. If anyone, with rash daring, has departed from its definition, he has denied the Gospel of Christ. There is one congregation of the faithful, the holy Church, mother of Christians, outside whose unity [unclear] will be saved; and if it sometimes appears weak in morals, nevertheless, always constant in faith, it has never erred, while the loving-kindness of Christ remains intact.

Concerning the Reprobate and Maleficent Persons. Fifth Question.

The fifth question of your most serene Highness was this: Why are impious, evil, reprobate people, concerning the faith, such as those women whom in the common tongue we call witches, able to command malignant spirits, whereas good men, most zealous observers of the Christian faith, can command neither good spirits nor always malignant ones?

To this question I remember that I replied to myself some time ago as follows. In all the works of the divine majesty there is a sequence and order of beauty, of inviolable equity, by which individual things, suitably disposed, persevere in the rank which they have received. For without its proper order nothing subsists in the world. In this order the freedom of the will, which the Creator of all gave to human beings, is driven by no violence of power, so that the first man might always remain in the order which he received from the beginning of his creation,

Hence no one among mortals is good unless aided, properly speaking, by the counsel of his will through the grace of the merciful God; and no one is evil unless, of his own accord, deprived of grace, [he has] the obstacle of sin. By uprightness of will, however, we are made like the good spirits, if we confirm the piety of the faith which we have in Christ by the necessary holy works. And just as the consummation of a good will makes good men equal to angelic spirits, so the perversity of the impious renders them like demons. Hence evil and perverse men, the more they have been depraved by the malice of their own will, the more they become like demons in disposition.

But likeness introduces the intimacy of friendship, from which mutual confidence is gradually generated. From the confidence of the lesser toward the greater there arises authority, whether true or feigned by cunning. Thus if any authority of depraved men is seen to exist over demons, it arises from the greatness of their depravity: namely, when their disposition is so far depraved that by a reprobate will they either surpass or equal the malice of the demons who join themselves to them. For demons are not all equal in malice or intelligence; rather one is much more cunning than another in agility of understanding, and far worse in depraved affection. For those who inhabit [unclear] and caves are assuredly duller than the rest, to such an extent that they fear swords and rods and seem to be admonished by the threats of men who terrify them, as may be observed in those whom we call energumens. But demons who dwell farther removed from the earth are subtler in nature and meet with men more rarely.

Men full of malice, however, the more they have advanced in perversity of will, the more they become like demons; and once admitted by them into familiarity, they thereafter become bold, and they receive authority over the demons whose familiarity they use, not by violent power but by feigned pretense. For demons, in order to keep in their depravity those men whom they have once received into surrender as willing subjects, gladly submit themselves to them as if moved by a simulated dominion; and what they do voluntarily, they pretend they are compelled to do in obedience. For no one obtains true authority over demons except him whom faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, through the merit of holiness, has made acceptable and a friend to God. For thus Scripture says of those who truly believe in the Lord Jesus: “And he gave them power over all demons.”

Evil men, therefore, command demons, whom malevolence has made like to them, likeness has made familiar, and familiarity has made their own and subject. Just as, if some servant of a great prince, lowered in rank, yet joined to him by long familiarity, is said to command him, from whom he obtains without contradiction everything he has asked, so that he himself seems rather to rule his lord than to be ruled by him. According to this likeness, evil and reprobate men, because they are admitted into the demons’ familiarity and by more prolonged confidence become very bold, receive [unclear] they have deserved by likeness. Hence whatever they have demanded from demons joining with them by an implicit or explicit compact, they receive, unless at times, being forbidden by divine ordinance, they cannot provide what is sought. Yet they do not thus everywhere join themselves to all reprobate and evil persons, but only to those with whom, by the intervention of a compact, they have entered into certain agreements: such as women who are witches, who have rendered homage to the devil, and those invokers of demons whom the common people call by the usual word necromancers.

There are two kinds of men who can lawfully command demons.

The first, indeed, is of those men who, beloved by God by the merit of holiness, [receive] from him the power of trampling the head of the ancient serpent

received: such as, in the primitive Church, were the apostles and their followers and disciples, concerning whom the Lord speaks in the holy Gospel: “In my name they shall cast out demons,” and “they shall take up serpents.”

But the second kind is of those persons to whom, by reason of their order in the Church of God, it is granted that, having received the power of the ministry, they may drive demons from human bodies. And this ministry is committed to exorcists in the Church of God, namely when they are ordained in apostolic fashion.

Again, there are two kinds of persons who desire to command demons; and they show, by their most wicked conditions, that they presume to do this unlawfully.

The first, most pernicious kind is that of witches, who enter into pacts with demons, and, after a solemn profession has first been made, hand themselves over to some demon as his property and for perpetual service. How great are the evils which this most pernicious kind of persons works in your empire, most wise Caesar, there is no one who can express. For first of all, denying God, the faith of Christ, and holy baptism, they offer themselves, in mind and body, to demons; by their sorceries they make men and beasts sick, harm them, and kill them. There is no disease which, God permitting, they cannot bring on, because, since they show themselves servants to demons in the observance of the covenant that has been contracted, in comparison with those demons they dare whatever they wish. Hence they are nowhere to be tolerated, but rather in every place to be utterly exterminated, as God, creator of all, commands thus: “You shall not suffer sorcerers to live.” Of witches, some call upon demons with incantations; others entice them with prayers and sacrifices; the rest, provoking them with unspeakable things and ceremonies, draw them into the aid of their impiety. It is therefore not to be wondered at that witches seem to command demons, to whom, through the impiety of a perverse will, they have become like, and with whom they are in mutual concord.

The second kind of wicked persons who wish to command demons is that of those whom we commonly call necromancers. They profess arts full of execrations, by which they promise that they can summon demons into a circle, or show them openly visible, enclosed in a crystal or some other vessel. These most pernicious men, full of falsehood and superstitions, commit such great evils as no good man could imagine. For in order to entice demons into obedience to themselves, they very often use the foulest sacrifices and enter into an explicit pact with them. They carry about many various little books full of filth, impiety, and falsehood, falsely inscribed with the names of ancient philosophers and sages; by displaying these they deceive many unwary and curious people and draw them with themselves into the demons’ pit. They promise great and utterly incredible things; by the hearing of these, they hold men suspended in wonder at the falsehood. By rings, pentacles, images, exorcisms, and conjurations, they say that demons, though malignant, can be constrained, so that they appear visibly in a circle, or in a crystal, or in some other receptacle, and answer distinctly to all questions asked. All indeed promise this, but in our times very few are found whom the malignant spirits, even in evil matters, obey in this way, since God, for a most just reason, does not permit it: lest human curiosity, prone to novelties, after despising the religion of Christ, should in necessity seek help from demons. But all those whom malignant spirits, summoned by the conjurations of necromancers, obey have without doubt passed into fellowship with them by an explicit or implicit pact. Yet the number of the rest is greater: those whom the malignant spirits disdain to obey, although in profane matters they do not fear to occupy themselves always with the arts of necromancers. And because especially in our times iniquity has begun to abound, and charity has grown cold, these accursed and most deceitful men have gained too much strength; and although they are despised by demons, nevertheless, persevering in their most pernicious doctrines, they deceive many.

Believe me, Caesar, this most deceitful race of men is very harmful to your sacred empire, and therefore must be utterly exterminated no less than a swarm of witches. They promise great things and lie in everything. Indeed, all the things that are promised in their books are empty and false, and they furnish those who believe them with nothing other than tricks, frauds, and the most subtle deceptions. But if at any time they seem to provide what they have promised, it becomes clear to all that this happens only through the cooperation of demons; fellowship with them must be shunned no less than the most savage torments of hell. For demons very often attend these necromantic operations, and, in order to keep their invokers stubborn in the treachery they have begun, they grant them, if they can, what they have asked. Sometimes, however, when summoned by conjurations, they scorn to appear; and nevertheless they have led astray the [minds?] of those invoking them.

There is also another kind of men, no less foolish than superstitious, namely those who do not wish to have any dealings with demons, and nevertheless in their vain operations use things assigned to demons, and for that reason wholly illicit. For they think that a great and hidden power is present in characters, and so they commit various errors against the faith of Christ. But since it is not the task of the present moment to rehearse their madness, let us pursue our purpose.

Why good and just men do not obtain command over demons must be stated briefly. Just as likeness of wills makes evil and impious men equal to demons, so dissimilarity of wills makes the good and just wholly opposed to them. Among opposites and dissimilars there can be no familiarity; rather, continual hostility and hatred prevail. But where no familiarity contracted through likeness of wills is found, there can be neither confidence of one toward the other nor mutual cooperation in the working of marvels. Nor do you, glorious Caesar, although you are a man and a great ruler and prince of men, admit as familiar to you anyone whose ways are altogether contrary and unlike to yours, and who continually resists your will. But good and upright men, because they always withstand the most depraved will of demons, can in no way pass over into fellowship with them; they neither wish nor consent to be familiar with them, but with all their strength flee and detest encountering them. And therefore they do not obtain that fictitious command over them of which we have spoken. For nowhere is familiarity secure where no likeness of wills has preceded it, nor can there be concord among opposites.

And yet demons do not obey all evil and reprobate persons indiscriminately, but only those with whom they are joined by pacts and services. And when invoked they willingly come to those whom they cannot otherwise keep faithful, although they lie that they are compelled. It is therefore not to be wondered at, most excellent Caesar, that malignant spirits sometimes seem to comply with depraved and perverse men, whom, as we have said, both malevolence and destruction directed against the human race have made like and concordant. But let it be far from every Christian, through a depraved likeness of will, to wish to command demons, because if anyone in this life begins to have fellowship with malignant spirits, in the future he will burn with them without end.

But why are good and just men unable to command the holy angels of God, into whose likeness of good will they have passed? I think the solution to this question could easily be given from what has been said above, if the difference of intellects is recalled to mind. For although there are many men established in the Church of God whose justice benefits many unto salvation, nevertheless very few in our times advance so far that, on account of the merit of sanctity, they are either to be feared by demons or received by angels into the fellowship of familiarity. Hence it happens that the men of our age neither, by the merit of sanctity, [unclear] malignant spirits

[unclear] of holiness command; nor does he deserve to be familiar with the holy angels. But if any have advanced to that degree of holiness in which, working miracles in the Church, as the saints once advanced, they can now powerfully command demons and have familiar fellowship with the spirits of the blessed. For it is certain that holy men beloved by God in the primitive Church of the Christians once, through the cooperation of good spirits, bestowed greater benefits on mortals than the wickedness of depraved men could ever have inflicted as harms through the ministry of demons. For whoever, a true worshipper of God, has become like the holy angels, can do many wondrous things by prayers.

On the Power of Witches. Sixth Question.

The sixth question of your most invincible majesty was: whence comes this so great power to witches, by which they can accomplish so many various wonders even in a single hour, such and so great as no one of the good could accomplish in his whole life?

To this question, if we wish to answer briefly, we must necessarily say that all power is from the Lord God, without whom no creature can do anything. For Christ says in the holy Gospel: “Without me you can do nothing.” Hence it is manifest that all power of doing anything is granted to human beings by the Lord God and from no other source, whether men do good or evil. Hence the most holy prelate Augustine says: “The will of God is the first and highest cause of all bodily forms and motions; and nothing happens in this most vast and immense commonwealth of the whole visible creation which is not either commanded or permitted from the inner, invisible, and intelligible court of the supreme emperor, according to the ineffable justice of rewards and punishments.”

Therefore, Caesar, it must not be doubted that that power of witches, in which, with the cooperation of demons, they produce wondrous and horrible effects, is granted by the Lord God, whose will no one can resist, and without whose influence a man cannot even move his hand. For the holy doctors conclude that neither demons nor witches can do anything, whether to harm a man or a beast, unless God himself wills it, consents, and grants the power, so that they may do what they have already resolved upon with a perverse will. Unless God consents and wills, no creature can do anything at all; otherwise, if something could happen without his willing and consenting to it, it would necessarily follow that God is weak, since he could not prevent what, unconquered, he would be forced to permit to happen. But because every man, insofar as he is a creature, depends on God, he can do nothing without the will of him from whom he has both the willing and the power.

Whatever, therefore, witches do is done by God’s permission; without his will they can do nothing, because, unless God has granted it, they obtain neither from themselves nor from demons the ability to do what they wish. And so all power is from the Lord God, in whom all things are moved as in the first cause of all things; for from him from whom we have received freedom of choice, from him also we have the power to do what we will. But since the understanding of witches is much confused, they do not perpetrate the evils they do by human art, but by the cooperation of demons, whom nature has made subtle and long experience has made swift in producing wonders. For the effects of witches are not caused by such means as they use for witchcraft, such as heads of the dead, toads, serpents, characters, images, and things similar to these, but by the devil who established these signs; since he is most proud, he desires in all things to be seen as comparable to God. For just as God once instituted sacraments in his Church, which, when worthily administered, signify and produce a saving effect, while he himself assists and works the salvation which he instituted, so the devil, who desires nothing more than to be esteemed equal to God, instituted certain signs as if sacraments; and when he is invoked by them by those to whom he is bound by covenant pacts, the malignant operator assists, and as often as God has permitted it, he effects the evil that is asked; if God has not permitted it, he does nothing at all. For all the effects of necromancers, witches,

the devil is the operator: he, through the application of means which he himself first established, produces the desired work in the subject matter, sometimes really, sometimes only apparently. But women who are witches, who with their will already depraved and with consent have passed by pacts into fellowship with demons, receive from them certain marks and symbolic signs; when these are summoned by them, the demons at once come. In these pernicious operations of demons nothing is stronger than the foolish credulity of witches, which is increased by pacts and vows, since the firmer the faith they have placed either in the demons or in their signs, the more swiftly they obtain the operation, with those demons cooperating. For the excessively savage depravity of the witches’ will in a certain way turns them into madness; when this has preoccupied the mind, the demons at once apply themselves to those who are raging, and, invited by pacts and signs, God permitting, they grant to the madwomen the effect of their petition. For Plato related something similar in the book On Poetic Frenzy, saying: just as Bacchic women, when not of sound mind, draw honey and milk from rivers, but when of sound mind cannot draw them. This, however, is effected by their spirit, carried outside itself into fellowship with an evil demon. We have established that witches have drawn butter from stirred-up rivers at times, which can in no way happen otherwise than by the ministry of a demon. In a similar way, when women have been brought into hatred of some man or beast, sighing for his destruction, they are driven by a very grievous frenzy, thinking of nothing in their mind except revenge. They take things known and familiar to them for witchcraft, invoke the demons, show the signs instituted by them together with the characters; and what they cannot accomplish by their own power, they obtain by the ministry of those demons. But another person, who is not subject to demons by pact and surrender, even if he knows the things suitable for witchcraft as well as the method of working, and although he displays the signs, nevertheless rarely obtains the effect, because he is not reckoned among the familiars of demons. For to such a degree the devil, puffed up with pride, imitates the church of Christ, that just as one who has not been ordained cannot consecrate the body of Christ, however much he may pronounce the words of consecration, so also a demon, however much he is invoked and signs or characters are shown to him, either never or rarely comes to the aid of one whom he does not know to be subject to himself by pact. For if he came indiscriminately to all who invoked him, without pacts being interposed, he would not procure so many witches, subject to him by right of ownership. Every day we see demons being summoned to a circle, to a mirror, or to any other receptacles by dreadful conjurations, with men laboring, and they achieve no effect, because either God’s command stands in the way, or the devil despises the curious man not dedicated to himself by homage. For three things are required for witchcraft, without which it is agreed that none is perpetrated: a witch raging in mind and depraved in will; also the cooperation of a familiar demon; and before all things divine permission. But if one of these does not concur, the witchcraft will not be able to be perpetrated. For if God did not permit it, neither the devil nor the witch could do anything. And if the devil did not come to the aid of the wicked woman’s will, she would perpetrate no witchcraft. Again, if the witch is lacking, the devil will in no way complete the witchcraft. For he uses the will of the raging witch as an artisan uses an instrument for working; without it he could not inflict witchcraft. And just as demons differ from one another in power and in the keenness of their subtlety, so the power of witches is not one and the same in all of them, but differs in individuals according as demons of subtler or grosser nature come together with them. For there are many kinds of demons, and they stand apart from one another by fixed degrees, by reason of the places into which, falling from the beginning, they were thrust down. The first kind of demons indeed is called

[unclear] fiery: it wanders about the higher air and never sinks down to the lower regions before the Day of Judgment; but, remaining continually beneath the lunar regions, they have no dealings with human beings on earth. That they remain beneath the moon Saint Augustine testifies in the work On the Christian Combat, saying thus: Demons do not dwell in heaven, where the sun and stars are, but all move about beneath the lunar region. Moved by this, as I think, Apuleius said that demons are fiery animals, because Aristotle confirmed that in burning furnaces certain small animals had often been seen flying about, furnished with little wings; these spend their whole life in fire, since they arise with the fire and are extinguished with it, and, vanishing, return to their own place whence they had come. They have no association with acts of sorcery, because, since they dwell in fire, on account of their subtlety they cannot put on a gross or airy body.

The second kind is called aerial, because, wandering in the air, it dwells near us. These indeed can descend to the lower regions and, having assumed bodies from denser air, sometimes appear visible to human beings. When God permits, they often disturb the air, stir up thunder and storms, and all together conspire for the destruction of the human race. They are moved, like human beings, by the affections of the passions, especially by pride and envy, and they are vexed by continual disturbances; they are neither clothed in a solid body nor remain in one place. Nor do they all have one form, but many, and these they change rather often according to the variety of the affections by which they either meet the spells of witches when summoned, or are driven by disturbance to do harm. For they have an altogether violent and frenzied disposition, full of disturbances; whence, when violently injured and disturbed, they very often devise sudden ambushes. While they make their attacks, in part they wish to remain hidden, in part they inflict violence. Witches, supported by the cooperation of these demons, are more powerful in doing harm in proportion as they have obtained the concurrence of one higher in their order. In the Life of Saint Anthony, Saint Athanasius said that the air is full of demons; Mercury, thrice-greatest, had said this earlier too, namely that no part of the world is without the presence of demons. The holy bishop Ambrose also says: The world is full of holy powers, because it is full of wickednesses. Hence the Platonists have handed down that demons flying in the air, like very dense fiery snow, are visible to those desiring it, if for some time, with the sun shining, they continue to direct their gaze toward heaven with eyes not beaten back. But I do not know whether the object in the air is caused by real consistency, or whether the motion of the eyes, being cut off, presents false images; nevertheless not without slight detriment to the sense I undertook an experiment of the things promised.

The third kind, however, we call terrestrial demons; we do not in the least doubt that they fell from heaven to earth according to their deserts. Concerning these the most holy bishop and martyr of Christ, Theophorus, formerly Ignatius, wrote thus in a certain letter to the Ephesians: There is nothing better than to have peace, in which every weapon of the aerial and likewise the terrestrial spirits is made void. Of these demons some move about in forests and groves and lay ambushes for hunters; others live in open fields and cause travelers to wander at night; some dwell in hidden places and caves; the rest, less frenzied and disturbed than the others, delight to dwell with human beings in the dark. They are not led by one affection but by various ones, since some are less depraved than others, although all are full of evil disturbances. Of these, some rejoice in terrifying human beings by illusions alone; others desire to draw their hearers into admiration of themselves by predictions of future things. Some, however, strive with this whole effort: to [unclear] human beings disturbed by irrational frenzy or

may terrify, harm, or kill those who are raving with melancholy; this we have known by experience to have happened rather often. Hence Saint John Chrysostom, in the third book of On Providence to the monk Stagyrius, says: “The greatness of grief is more powerful for doing harm than any diabolical action, because the devil conquers whomever he conquers through grief. If you remove it, no one will be able to be harmed by a demon.”

This kind of demons, however, is rarely familiar to witches, because of the inconstancy of its affections and the frivolity by which they delight in terrifying many rather than being subject to the command of one wretched little woman. Yet sometimes, as they promise to madwomen, they dwell in glass or in crystal or in a mirror, and, stirred up by charms, give answers to women. And if someone who is about to come has spoken ill of them on the road, they foretell it. And this kind of witch sometimes differs greatly from the rest, since those whom the former make sick by sorcery, the latter promise to cure. But because for the most part they repel sorcery by sorcery, access to them is forbidden by the Church to every Christian.

The fourth kind of demons is called aquatic, because, immersing itself in waters, it dwells around lakes and rivers, full of anger, troubled, restless, and deceitful. In the sea it stirs up storms, and, sinking ships into the deep, takes life from many in the waters. And whenever these demons assume a visible body, they more often appear in the female sex, and are seen more rarely in the male, because they live in damp places and follow a softer course of life, nor can they easily assume a manly form according to the custom of the others. Hence antiquity long ago named the Naiads and Nereids, nymphs of the waters, not with the male sex but with the female. Among our people, moreover, aquatic women, that is, Wasserfrauen, are so called by the common term.

But those who dwell in drier, somewhat arid places, whenever they appear visibly to human beings in bodily form, transform themselves into men. They also assume the forms of different beasts, according as they are touched by various affections. But the holy angels, since they are never changed in affection, always appear uniformly in male form. For nowhere do we read it written that a good spirit was seen in the form of a woman or of any beast, but always in male appearance. Demons, however, have very often been seen around rivers and springs in the appearance of women: sometimes dancing, sometimes letting down their hair in the manner of women, and sometimes speaking with human beings and carrying out various mockeries. And this kind of demons has not customarily had commerce with witches.

The fifth kind is called subterranean, because it dwells in caves, caverns, and remote hollows of mountains. And these demons are very evil in disposition, and they especially attack those who dig wells and mines, and those who seek treasures hidden in the earth; they are most ready for the destruction of the human race. They make openings in the earth and stir up flame-vomiting winds; they shake the foundations of buildings. Sometimes at night, coming out of the mountains in troops, they lead marvelous and astonishing dances in the fields, as though fearing the command of a single leader. At a sign they suddenly vanish and return to their hiding places. At times the sound of little bells is heard among them; sometimes they falsely claim that they are the spirits of men departed from life. They seek nothing more than human fear and wonder. Hence we have found that they have sometimes led certain simpler people into their hiding places in the mountains, showing astonishing spectacles to those who marveled, and falsely claim that there are dwellings of the blessed there, and that they are friends of the living.

Among these demons, too, some are brooding guardians of treasures, which the avarice of mortals has hidden in the earth; lest they again come into human use, they remove them, steal them, guard them, and sometimes transfer them from place to place. And this kind of demons has not customarily had any [unclear] with witch-women.

[unclear]. The sixth kind of demons, however, is called light-fleeing, because they greatly abhor and detest the light: for they never appear by day, nor can they assume a body in any way except at night. This is the business that walks about in darkness: a kind of demons inscrutable and utterly dark, and stirred by cold passions; malicious, restless, and disturbed, which violently crushes men who meet it in the hours of night, and very often, God permitting, kills some either by its breath or by its touch. This kind of demons does not suit sorcerers, nor can it be constrained by charms, because it flees both the light and the voices of men, and likewise every tumult. The aerial kind is especially accustomed to present itself for the sorceries of women, since it is subtler than all the rest, and of most audacious rashness. Some of the terrestrial demons also, as has been said, serve sorcerers; yet these, being held to be of a lower rank, can by no means bring about those greater sorceries. It is therefore manifestly clear that the whole power of sorceresses, by which they do such astonishing things, is granted to demons by the Lord God within limits, and when he does not permit it, they accomplish nothing.

On Divine Permission. Seventh Question.

The seventh question of your most serene majesty was this: Why does almighty God, since he is just and the avenger of evils, permit such great sorceries to be done to the destruction of the human race, by which not only sinners, but also many innocent persons perish, grievously tormented? To this question I remember that, when I was formerly placed before your majesty, I answered in this way. Almighty God is just, upright, gracious, merciful. What he permits, he permits justly, since he is just; there is no iniquity with him, but all things that are done or that he permits are in true judgment. Therefore, when it is asked why God permits evils to be done, we answer: He permits them for this reason, because he is just. Let not the answer we have given seem absurd to your majesty, O Caesar, since it in no way prejudices the divine goodness that he permits evils to be done for a most just reason; rather, indeed, it would prejudice it if he did not permit evils to be done in the present world. For truly, if he did not permit evils to be done, man would now be unable to sin; he would certainly be impeccable, which does not belong to his nature, to which from the beginning the Creator of all gave free will. For since man is a creature and not the Creator, he is necessarily as capable of being turned toward good as toward evil; his being depends on the supreme maker of all creatures, just as everything caused depends on the cause of its own being. But to create has been left to God alone, who is incorruptible and everlasting; everything corruptible, however, necessarily fails, but is preserved by the goodness of the Creator so long as it does not lose the influence of its cause. Hence it neither could nor ought to have come to pass that man should be created impeccable by the condition of his nature, a thing which only God, the maker of all, naturally enjoys, who is immutable and everlasting. Whenever, indeed, it is conferred on man that he seems unable to sin, the freedom of choice is not removed, nor is the possibility simply taken away, but the will is confirmed in good. And as often as this gift is conferred on a creature, it is a gift of grace, not of nature. For Scripture says: God from the beginning created man, and left him in the hand of his own counsel. For, properly speaking, it cannot be that mortal man, conceived in original displeasure, should both have free will and be unable to commit sin. For the most holy bishop Augustine says: The first freedom of the will was to be able to sin; the last, in glory, will much more be to be unable to sin. Therefore, if man could not sin, he would not have mastery over his own will. Hence, although almighty God does not will sin, yet he justly permits men to sin and to do evil, so that, while freedom of choice remains, both the virtue of a good work may receive its reward, and voluntary depravity may receive the evil it has done. For no one either

does good or sins unwillingly. Therefore almighty God justly permits men to sin and to do evil, to whom from the beginning he granted freedom of choice. But there are many reasons, long since assigned by the holy doctors, why the Almighty permits such great evil deeds to be done through the cooperation of demons; of these, in due order, we shall briefly make mention.

The first is that the excellence of divine power may be manifested, for he alone is unchangeable and above every positive law. But every mutable creature has no comparison with the unchangeable Creator. Hence one reads in Numbers: God is not like a man, that he should lie, nor like a son of man, that he should be changed. In Isaiah too it is said: God is faithful, without iniquity, just and upright. In the book of Tobit also it is written: You are just, Lord, and all your judgments are true, and all your ways are mercy, truth, and judgment. And in the book of holy Job we read: Far be impiety from God, and iniquity from the Almighty. For he will render to a man his work, and according to the ways of each he will repay them. Therefore every man who rightly understands his own ignorance and weakness openly acknowledges that he is as nothing in comparison with his Creator. For God justly permits man to sin, both so that freedom of choice may be continued, and so that the excellence of the great God may become known to men.

The second reason is that the inscrutable wisdom of God may become known to mortals: that he knows how to draw good from our evils, when he makes the sin of one person become the merit of another for the increase of virtue. For if he did not permit evil to be done, which of us would understand the good? For God makes and ordains the good; evils, however, he does not make, but he himself disposes that those committed by the impious should not come about in a disorderly way. Nor does the malice of men impede the will of God, nor can man do anything that God does not permit.

The third cause is that the Almighty permits evil deeds to be done in order to manifest his most merciful goodness toward those who have sinned and have done penance; this he could in no way show if he did not permit the creature to sin. For if there were no sinner, God could not be one who has mercy. But since in many things we all offend, everywhere God finds something to remit; everywhere the guilty person presents himself, in whom the kindly Creator may show his mercy. Hence the holy bishop Augustine: If the disease were slight, the physician would be despised and would not be sought; if the physician were not sought, the disease would not be ended. Therefore where sin abounded, grace also abounded, which alone distinguishes the redeemed from the lost, whom the mass of perdition, drawn from the origin of creation, gathers into one. Therefore the mercy of the Lord is over all his works.

The fourth reason for divine permission is that the justice of the Creator may be declared toward those who have sinned and have not done penance, since if all did good and no one sinned, God’s justice would have nothing to punish. Therefore, so that justice may have a place, by divine permission the creature sins. For the Lord is just, who will render to each according to the work of his will.

The fifth reason is the dignity of the human condition, because if God did not permit man to sin, men would seem worse than brute beasts, which, with no violence driving them, freely use the motions of nature. For even if brute beasts lack reason, nevertheless they have a free motion of nature which they follow; in comparison with this man would seem of a lower condition, if he did not have free choice of the will. But God permitted free will to man, over which neither kings nor princes rule.

The sixth reason is the praise of the merit of steadfastness in human virtue, since we praise a just man for this reason, that although he could have transgressed, he did not transgress, but, with the grace of God assisting him, remained in the steadfastness of a good will.

The seventh reason why almighty God permits demons to do such great evil deeds through the agency of witches is that those who, scorning truth, delight in falsehood may, seduced by the devil, the inventor of falsehood, be utterly deceived. For it is fitting that enchanters and witches, who despise the saving teachings of Christ, should all, deceived by demons, be plunged down to hell to be punished forever. They seek aid from demons, the enemies of the whole human race, and they despise the Savior of the world, whom alone they ought to have adored. For it is just that he who, deserting truth by his own spontaneous will, adheres to falsehood should be cast headlong by the devil into destruction.

The eighth cause is the manifestation of divine power, whose might and virtue are over every creature. Indeed, when almighty God sometimes permits great things to the devil and denies certain small things, it is apparent how weak the enemy of the human race is, and subject to the divine majesty in all things; whatever he does, he does with God permitting it. Therefore the cause of all

[unclear] on account of which almighty God permits evil deeds to be done is justice: by which he preserves, in inviolable order, the liberty that he once from the beginning conferred upon the creature. But because the power of every creature, dependent upon its creator, is restricted and limited, it is plain that neither can the devil do everything he wishes, nor can a man, however depraved in will. The will indeed is free, but power is limited by certain and necessary degrees. For if demons could do everything they wish, nothing among human affairs would remain safe, but they would undermine everything. The history of Saint Job shows by a manifest example that the power of demons is bound: Satan did not dare to tempt him beyond what had been permitted him by divine dispensation. For no one in the present world, however just or strong, could withstand the fury of demons, if they could always freely use the power of doing harm at their own discretion. Before the Lord’s Passion they used a greater liberty of power than afterwards; but when Christ tasted death for us on the altar of the cross, from then on their power was greatly diminished, as the Savior says in the Gospel: “Now the prince of the world will be cast out.”

For indeed the humility of Christ and the perseverance of the saints have greatly restrained the boldness of demons, so that they can rightly be called kindlers of evils, but by no means compellers. Nor would the devil prevail against us unless he received strength from our sins. Hence Scripture admonishes us, saying: “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” And again: “Do not give place to the devil.” Therefore, to bring the discourse to a conclusion for the understanding of the proposed question, why God permits so many evil deeds to be done, I believe the reasons have been sufficiently made plain. For if the will of demons is always wicked, nevertheless their power can never be unjust, because what it wickedly wills it has from its own choice, but what it can wickedly do it has from God alone. And these things have been said as far as concerns those who do evil.

But why does almighty God permit demons to injure men, through the agency of evildoers, who have been baptized in the name of the holy Trinity and faithfully believe in his only-begotten Son, our Lord Jesus Christ? For if they could injure only evil, perverse unbelievers in body and possessions, but were restrained from approach to and injury of the good and faithful, his permission would rightly seem to be a just judgment. But now good and innocent people are more frequently made ill by the evil deeds of demons, and sometimes are even deprived of life, to pass over in silence the loss of goods that those subjected to sorcery very often suffer. It troubles many why the Almighty permits these things, he who permits nothing unjustly.

For this proposed question, I shall assign in order, as briefly as I can, the necessary reasons, received from no others than the ancient and Catholic doctors. And the first reason is the testing of the faith of Christians and the experience of integrity: so that, when scourged by the evil deeds of demons, they may learn in the sufferings of the flesh what faith and love toward God they have hidden in the mind. In prosperity it is not difficult to be long-suffering; but in adversity, with humble patience, to await from the Savior of the faithful

aid: it belongs not to weak but to strong and truly faithful Christians. In his tribulation the most holy Job learned how great a steadfastness of faith he had toward God, which before, in tranquillity, he had guarded piously without the dart of temptation.

At the same time it should be noted from this that those whom the malefices of demons or of men have in any way made infirm, and who, in order to recover health, either approach or consult any sorcerous enchanters, whether by themselves or through others, act against the commandments of God and of the Church; and they have neither true faith in God nor love. For they prefer the health of dying flesh to God; they seek salvation not from Christ but from the devil, through his minister. For they prefer to live healthy but unhappily in the name of the devil, rather than to suffer a little here for the love of Christ and afterward rejoice with him forever. But the person who does not approach sorcerers because God has forbidden it, preferring to live in poverty and sickness with observance of God's commandments rather than against God in riches and bodily health: he truly loves God and rightly keeps the integrity of the Christian faith.

Most sacred Caesar, men corrupt in mind and reprobate concerning the faith are not to be tolerated among Christians: those who cure the bewitched by malefices; who reveal thefts and adulteries by the ministry of demons; who foretell future things by inspection of stones or mirrors. I beg you, do not listen to those who, ignorant of divine laws, consider ministers of demons of this sort useful to your empire because they know how to undo malefices by malefice. For that pernicious healing of bodies brings death to souls; it makes men withdraw from God, creator of all, and adhere to impious apostate demons, with whom after death they will be damned forever.

The second reason why almighty God permits the innocent to be harmed by malefice is the increase of merits: namely, so that, when their patience has been proved in tribulation, it may merit a worthier crown of glory in heaven. For, as holy Augustine says, a man is unknown to himself as to what he can bear and what he cannot bear. Sometimes he [fears?] that he cannot bear what nevertheless he can. When temptation comes, like a kind of interrogator, a man is discovered by himself, who before, being hidden, did not know himself. The holy arch-apostle Peter, before temptation came upon him, was hidden both from himself and from others, namely that he was heedless and weak; it came, and the weakness that had lain hidden appeared. Therefore temptation is the greatest proving of a man, as sacred Scripture bears witness: the furnace proves the potter's vessels, and the temptation of tribulation proves just men. Patience is easy in prosperity, when no adversities beat upon the mind. But many are the tribulations of the just; yet from them all our Lord Jesus Christ will deliver them.

The third reason for divine permission is the preservation of humility, so that the faithful and just man may always fear God and never presume upon his own strength or justice. Hence Scripture says of the reprobate: They are not in the labor of men, and with men they will not be scourged. Therefore pride held them; they were covered with their iniquity and impiety; their iniquity came forth as if from fatness. It belongs to the mercy of God that he sometimes permits good and just men to be shaken by adversities, whom he knows cannot be humbled in prosperous circumstances. For tribulation has made many humble whom favorable circumstances would have made proud. Finally, the fearful imagining of malefices makes a good man fear his God and diligently call upon his aid. Let no one, proud and presuming upon his own powers, think himself safe from the malefices of demons; for [whomever?] the protection of God abandons, inflated with pride, lies open to the malefices of demons [unclear].

The fourth reason is so that there may be a distinction between the good and the evil. For Scripture says of good men, beloved by God, in the Acts of the Apostles, that through many tribulations we must enter into the kingdom of God. And holy Paul, lover of Christ, says in a certain epistle: All who wish

... to live piously in Christ will suffer persecution. The most wise king Solomon also says in Proverbs: Whom the Lord loves, he corrects, and as a father he takes pleasure in his son. For a Christian it is a very glorious thing, for love of God, to bear adversities patiently, whether they are inflicted by evil men or by demons. For power is given to the devil and his ministers to harm good and just men, not to their confounding, as [unclear] suppose, but rather to the greatest and sure consolation of the soul. For when a just man lives well, harms no one, offends no one, does injury to no one, loves his God with his whole heart, fears and venerates him, keeping his commandments with all solicitude, and nevertheless is afflicted by evildoers, whether in body, in possessions, or in both, that man is truly blessed, since, when he has been tested, he will receive the crown of life which God has promised to those who love him. Everyone who lives rightly in the unity of the faith of the catholic Church of Christians, and patiently bears for love of God the evils he receives in this world, is a sure sign that he will persevere in the grace of God, to be saved. On the contrary, concerning the wicked reprobate we read it written thus: Why do the wicked live? They have been raised up and strengthened with riches. Their houses are secure; the rod of God is not upon them. They spend their days in good things; in a moment they go down to hell. For it is a manifest sign of damnation if here you live wickedly in sins and vices, contrary to God, while prospered in the goods of fortune and in bodily health. The fifth reason why the Almighty permits good and just men to be afflicted by the wicked reprobate is for the complete purification of merits. For, as Scripture says, there is no just man on earth who does good and does not sin. But since God lets no sin pass unpunished, he appoints temporal punishments for just men, through mercy, for their offenses, but eternal punishments for the impious reprobate, through justice. Therefore, out of mercy, he changes eternal punishment into temporal punishment for the penitent, which it is necessary that they suffer either in this world or after death in purgatory. But because the torments of purgatory are dreadful and very grave, the merciful God is accustomed to purify in this life, in various ways, the penitents whom he loves, through the inconveniences of diverse tribulations in body and in possessions.

For the evil deeds of the impious benefit good and just men as a remedy, but bring damnation upon those who inflict them. The sixth reason is that a man, harmed through the assaults of demons, may be recalled to penitence and may resolve in his heart upon the necessary amendment of his life. For Almighty God does not immediately send vengeance when we sin, but waits for our amendment until a predetermined time. But if we neglect to do penance, the avenger of evils comes to us when we do not think it; and [unclear]. Hence the holy prophet speaks in the person of God, saying: If his sons abandon my law and do not walk in my judgments and do not keep my commandments, I will visit their iniquities with the rod, and their sins with blows; but my mercy I will not scatter from them, nor will I harm my truth.

The seventh reason why Almighty God permits the evil deeds of demons to prevail over the good and innocent is that too licentious an occasion of sinning may be cut away from them. For there are many poor and infirm people, pleasing to God, good, devout, and humble, whom poverty and bodily sickness preserve in the love of God; if they were rich and raised high with honors, they would quickly flow away from the resolve of holiness into the depth of vices. It is not expedient for all, for their salvation, to have honors and riches together with health; nor does a longer life always make a man better. Therefore almighty God, wishing to show his mercy toward those whom he has chosen, permits the good, just, and innocent to be subject to various calamities.

And sometimes through demons, sometimes through evil men, sometimes by various other ways and means, he takes away from men of this sort the riches and honors which he foresaw they would use badly, so that in poverty and abasement they may preserve the humility which, placed in wealth and high estate, they would by no means have preserved. He also quite often permits them to fall into many great illnesses, when cheerful health of the flesh would have brought upon them the greatest illness of mind. Finally, he permits certain persons to be driven to death by sorcery, so that their opportunity for sinning may be cut off, an opportunity which they would have abused had they been allowed to live longer. Hence Scripture says of the just man: “He was snatched away lest malice change his understanding, or deceit beguile his soul.” The eighth reason for divine permission is that men may venerate the sacraments of the Church, which have great power against all the sorceries of malignant spirits. For he is rarely harmed by the sorceries of demons who venerates with due honor the sacraments and rites of the Catholic Church. And from the own confession of witches we have rather often heard that attendance at masses and the use of things blessed by the Church greatly weaken the powers of demons. For they are not blessed in the Church of God in vain, but so that they may be defenses of divine protection, tokens showing demons signs to be feared. As for infant children, who, reborn in Christ, are sometimes killed by the sorceries of demons or of men, we do not doubt that divine providence permits this to happen for their salvation, since it knows how to order all things for the better for mortals. Yet it often happens that infants perish by sorceries because of the offenses of their parents.

The eighth question of your Serenity was this: Whether it can be proved by natural reason, as also from the Holy Scriptures, that God has care for human affairs and actions, and a sure and infallible providence over all and each of the things that are done in the world.

To this question I remember that I answered as follows. The whole world, heaven and earth and all things that are in them, are subject to divine providence, by whose will and command they were brought forth into being from the beginning. For there is nothing in the whole universe that is not governed by the providence of the Creator. Let us confirm this opinion first by the Scriptures, and afterwards by reasons, as briefly as possible. In the book of Judith we read: “All your ways are prepared, and you have placed all judgments in your providence.” And in Ecclesiastes the most wise king Solomon speaks thus: “Do not give your mouth so as to make your soul sin; nor say before the angel, ‘There is no providence,’ lest perhaps the Lord, angered at your words, destroy all the works of your hands.” Most manifest testimonies of providence are confirmed in the holy Gospel, when our Savior says to the disciples: “Are not two sparrows sold for an assarius? And one of them does not fall to the ground before God?” A great commendation of divine providence, which has care not only for men but also for tiny birds. Indeed, if he cares for such small things, who would not believe that he has care for great things? “Look,” he says, “at the birds of heaven: they neither sow nor reap nor gather into barns, and your heavenly Father feeds them.” And a little later he adds, saying: “If God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is and tomorrow is cast into the oven, how much more you, of little faith?” [Almighty?] God, because he created all things and brought them into being when they did not exist, rules and governs the universe lest it fall and pass away; and this could in no way happen if he did not have providence and care for all things. For if providence is removed,

it is necessary that the order of the continuity of the whole universe be thrown into confusion. But the providence of the Creator cares for all things: for he who feeds the birds and gives the beasts their food, and fills every living creature with blessing, and clothes the grass of the field, adorning violets and lilies with beautiful comeliness, cannot forget man, whom he created from the beginning in his own image. He cares for all things who governs all things; and he exercises providence not only over man but also over all beasts. Since all things are placed under his dominion, there is no one who can resist his will in anything.

Let us now therefore consider this mighty structure of the whole universe, how in its original arrangement and motion it always persists most orderly: unless we shamefully depart from reason, we shall understand by the clearest reasoning that that divine and unchangeable providence preserves, directs, and governs these things. Then let us contemplate all earthly things, each and every one of which arises and proceeds most orderly in its natural disposition. This cannot happen by chance; rather they must be moved by the will of him by whose power they were made and created. Next, the earth placed in the middle of the world, like a point or center that unfolds the circle of the whole universe at equal distance: than this nothing more beautiful, nothing more adorned, nothing, finally, more delightful to the sense could offer itself for [unclear]. In this point of immense mass, wonderfully enclosed by the mass itself, we discern all things ordered, and nothing could be left unordered; so that all things which sometimes seem to us somehow to drift, we should know certainly, in view of the order of the universe, not to lack a certain order of their own. For by the simple and utterly unchangeable nod of God the whole structure of the entire universe, gathered from so many diverse and movable things, is most orderly governed in harmony. Certainly we see, in those things which present themselves to our senses, that the greater the intelligence and power that arises with time in any governor, the less can anything disordered happen by chance. Since, therefore, that supreme intellect, the creator, preserver, ruler, almighty God, governs the world by his unchangeable providence, holding all things under his command, certainly no place is left anywhere for rash chance, which might impede the will of so great a majesty.

Therefore the universe, whatever exists anywhere or can exist, is comprehended under the rule of one divine mind, whose infallible judgment nothing can escape. But unexpected events happen to us, because we are changeable and are changed almost daily, having no determined knowledge of future things. But that best maker of all things, God, since he is altogether unchangeable, knows all things, beholds all things, understands all things at once and simultaneously. His providence is not deceived; his will is never varied; his power is not broken; his ordering is not violated; his counsel is never interrupted, even if his decision sometimes seems to be changed. Hence, if we attend carefully, we shall plainly understand, since the ends of things and of motions will make it clear, that all these lower things are made, preserved, disposed, and moved by divine providence; to its command nothing at all is alien. For the Lord God of the universe himself understands all things individually, not stretched out after our fashion among many things, but abiding in himself as an indivisible one. By looking upon him, as upon the pattern of the whole universe, the cause of causes, and through causes the cause of all things, he beholds all things; in beholding he cares and provides, directing each thing to a good end by an everlasting order. Come now, most wise Caesar, in order that we may understand divine providence governing all things, let us employ arguments, as briefly as we can, according to our purpose. Therefore, if God’s action is his own understanding, which no wise man will fail to admit as at once most eminent and inward, as much as he acts, so much surely

understands, and conversely. But he acts in each thing, not only in great things but also in the smallest; therefore he understands individual things. For the most abundant influence of the first Being extends through individual things to whatever beings follow in fixed orders; and the things which act after him are everywhere moved and act by his power.

Therefore either God understands or acts upon nothing outside himself, which is false; or, by acting upon all things and each thing, he also understands those same things, which is true. For they would in no wise come to be unless first, as we speak in our own manner, they were understood by God himself, who makes them; just as those things are not made by the sun which are not looked upon by it. But because the Almighty understands all things and each thing that he makes, there is no doubt that he disposes, rules, and orders all things that he has made; from him things have not only that they exist, but also that they are certain causes of other things. And so, if things have from God that they are causes, from him also they have received the proper office of a cause: that is, to preserve according to their powers, and to care for what they have made. Wherefore, if all causes have this property from the first cause insofar as they are certain causes, then deservedly that first cause naturally has this goodness and providence, so that it cares for all things and each thing that it has made, insofar as it is most especially the cause of all and each of them. Indeed, unless individual things are preserved one by one by him who makes them, common things, which are preserved in individuals, will never be preserved. For neither will the whole, which consists of parts, be preserved if the parts themselves are neglected. Therefore from the intention of the first and most universal intelligence proceeds the universal distinction of things. But that intelligence is distinguished in itself from other things, and by the standard of its knowledge it distinguishes the rest among themselves. Hence, just as God knows all things and each thing most distinctly, so also he most distinctly rules, governs, and cares for them. Therefore, most clement Emperor Maximilian, I think it manifest and sufficiently shown that the providence of God, the supreme ruler, embraces, disposes, rules, and governs all lower things and each of them; for otherwise, without the provident disposition of one who watches over them, they would by no means maintain this most beautiful order that we perceive.

Nor does it escape me that the wise men of this world formerly held various opinions about providence. Some of them thought that this world was made not by providence but by chance; if their opinion were true, no place would be left for providence, but all things would necessarily drift at random, since the world, which was made by chance, could perish by chance. Against their false opinion others taught that the world could not have come into being without reason, nor certainly continue to exist unless it were ruled by the supreme prudence of its maker. Hence Boethius, a most Christian man, said: O you who govern the world by everlasting reason, begetter of earth and heaven, who command time to proceed from eternity, and, remaining stable, make all things move. And again he said: The generation of all things, and all the processes of mutable natures, and whatever is moved in any way, obtain their causes, order, and forms from the stability of the divine mind. But others thought that God cared only for incorruptible things, such as the heavenly bodies and separate substances, together with the species of things, but that he knew nothing else at all and utterly neglected all the rest. But these men erred shamefully, because the Almighty has provident care not only of incorruptible universals, but also of corruptible particulars. Hence the same Boethius again says: The high founder of things sits on the earth, and, ruling things, bends the reins: king, lord, source, origin, law, wise arbiter of justice. He is the continuous love for all things, and they seek again the good by the end he holds; because they cannot endure otherwise unless, turned back again by love, they flow back to the causes which he himself gave. But others, taking it ill that they themselves were neglected, exempted man from the number of corruptible things on account of the preeminence of his intellect, saying that God has care and providence for man, but despises all the other earthly creatures. Against their false opinion enough has been said before; to produce many things would be altogether superfluous. For Scripture says: Men and beasts you will save, O Lord. And in another place a certain wise man said: The small and the great

the Lord made; and he has equal care for all. Therefore all and each of the lower things, great and small, corruptible and incorruptible, the providence of the divine majesty orders, rules, disposes, and cares for; his most powerful will produced all things from nothing, as Sacred Scripture again bears witness: “But your providence, Father, governs all things from the beginning.”

Therefore let men blush who are corrupt in mind, impious and reprobate with regard to the Christian faith, who, puffed up with empty loquacity, remove the providence of him who knows all things, and do not attend to how great an injury they do to God. For what, to use the judgment of Firmianus, is so worthy and so proper to almighty God as providence? But if he provides for nothing, if he neglects lower things, if he does not care for mortal things, he has now lost all dignity. But it is impossible, as holy Anselm attests, for God to lose his honor; for, as the Peripatetic says, in eternal things there is no evil, nor corruption, nor sin. He therefore who takes away providence takes away the whole substance of God. And what does he say, except that God does not exist?

But now let those who deny that the providence of God cares for lower things tell me: if God neglects lower things, let them attend to what necessarily follows. If God knowingly neglects and despises us, there is henceforth no reason why we should either honor him with worship or venerate him with religion, since from him we obtain no benefit; rather, being neglected and despised, let us ourselves also neglect him. But if, not knowing us, he despises and wholly neglects us, there is now no reason for us to worship one who does not know us, and for that reason can confer no good, or to invoke him with prayers. For if God does not care for human affairs, whether knowingly or unknowingly, every reason for piety ceases, since there is no hope of salvation. What regard for piety can there be among mortals, what hope for the salvation of souls, if God does not care for human affairs? Indeed, if providence is taken away, whom do we worship, whom do we adore? If there is with God no providence for mortals, certainly he neither grants benefits to human beings nor imposes punishments on deserters; he can neither help mortals, nor wishes to, nor cares at all; he does not notice what we do, and he hears neither the prayers nor the supplications of anyone. Why do we offer him any worship; why honor, why prayers? Or why do we so greatly fear or dread a God who does not know us, who, with us neglected and despised, can neither do good to us nor harm?

For once providence is removed, neither holiness nor religion will remain; and when these have been extinguished, the greatest disorder of life and a dreadful confusion will follow. Once piety toward God is removed, what will the commonwealth be except everlasting confusion? Public faith among human beings will necessarily perish, and the fellowship of the human race, and all justice together with it, will vanish and perish. What must be thought of the Christian faith if God does not care for human affairs? What, finally, of the Savior of all, our Lord Jesus Christ, except that he will be reckoned an empty fable, wholly fictitious, if there is no providence of God caring for mortal things? Therefore whatever good we do, whatever evil we suffer for the love of God, is wholly vain and useless to us if he has no care for us.

Let those who deny the providence of God now see and shudder, when they perceive that the end of their opinion is the worst despair of all. Therefore let no one, induced by the vain-speaking of secular philosophers, train himself to contempt of God; let no one take away the providence of the highest and unchangeable good; let no one corrupt the dignity of the creator of all things. For all who deny divine providence show themselves both unworthy of the benefits of the most merciful Savior and ungrateful.

For it must be firmly believed, and in no way doubted, that this whole universe, both visible and invisible, and all things individually, whether they are in heaven or on earth or in the sea, are ruled and governed by divine providence, and that absolutely nothing in the whole universe is alien to his care.

For divine providence supplies to the human race both crops and all the other things that the earth brings forth: also storms and variations, the changes of times, by which all things that the earth produces, being endowed with nature, grow to maturity. And it provides for all things collectively and individually: not only the great, but even the very smallest, so far indeed that not even the most slender leaf of a tree falls to the ground without the will of almighty God the Father, who created it and rules and cares for it. But if anyone thinks that this so great magnitude of the whole universe cannot be directed and governed by one God, who alone is, he is greatly mistaken, and is shown not to know how great is the power of divine might. For indeed he who was able to bring the whole world from nothing into being can also govern forever, with the greatest wisdom, what he has made. For he knows all things, understands all things, can do all things: he alone, omnipotent, created all things.

We therefore, believing the holy Gospel, should above all venerate divine providence; and we should raise our minds upward, with whatever virtue we can, from these things that are perishable, and, being brought back to ourselves, be united, so that we may faithfully understand the majesty of God present everywhere. Since it is altogether uncircumscribable, it holds all things, fills all things, embraces all things, exceeds all things, and sustains all things. It does not sustain from one part and exceed from another; nor does it fill from one part and embrace from another; but by embracing it fills, by filling it super-embraces, by sustaining it exceeds, and by exceeding it sustains all things. He is nowhere by the mass of a body, and by his uncircumscribable substance he is nowhere absent; he is not seen by the eyes of flesh; he is seen through faith in purity of heart. O inexplicable power. O incomprehensible goodness. O ineffable wisdom. O uncircumscribable divinity: you do not consist of parts as a body does; you are not divided by affections as a soul is; you do not underlie forms as do all the other things that have been made through you; you are in all things and above all things, ruling and governing the universe with the greatest wisdom. By these testimonies, therefore, most sacred Caesar Maximilian, it has been sufficiently proved, as I think, that this whole universe is governed by the providence of God. Since he is pure intellect, simple, uncreated, and eternal, he knows all things, understands all things, foreknows all things; and since he is omnipotent by nature, he can do all things. To him nothing is difficult, nothing impossible; he, with his power, created such wondrous things; in truth he established them; by reason he perfected them; by strength he sustains them; by goodness he illumines them. To him be honor, to him glory, who lives and reigns, God glorious and exalted, forever and ever. Amen.

The Author’s Declaration to Caesar

These, most unconquered Caesar Maximilian, are the things that seemed to me should be said in reply to the Eight Questions proposed by your majesty. For you wished to have even my judgment on them in writing, making an estimate of me above the truth, since I am not to be compared in talent with those whose opinion you heard before me. Let pardon make me worthy if I have said anything less proper; for, at the command of your highness, while set as a traveler on a journey, I dictated as I could, at intervals, whatever occurred to me to answer. But I say from my mind and openly declare that I am a sincere confessor of the Christian faith, and that I wish to remain until death in the union of the sacrosanct Roman Church. Therefore, if anything either in this lucubration of mine or in others should be found said or written otherwise than that Church holds, thinks, believes, and teaches, as a true son of obedience, by the attestation of these presents I now simply revoke it, and wish it to be and to be held perpetually revoked.

Wherefore, most wise Caesar, I both humbly ask and earnestly admonish your majesty that, before you cause my responses to come to the knowledge of those for whom they are kept destined, you have them approved by the judgment of many. For it must be carefully ensured that nothing be proposed to those for whose salvation your serenity keeps watch except what is solid, approved, manifest, and lawfully confirmed in the Catholic faith by the opinion of very many wise men. May almighty God by his providence direct and guard you always to the praise of his name, Maximilian, greatest of emperors. From the city of Neometana, on the tenth day of the month of July, in the year of Christians one thousand five hundred and eight.

Johannes Trithemius, Abbot.

Printed at Oppenheim at the expense of Johannes Hasselberg, of Augia in the diocese of Constance. In the year of the Lord 1515, on the twentieth day of the month of September.

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