Liber Octo Quaestionum ad Maximilianum Caesarem
A Book of Eight Questions to Emperor Maximilian
prdl-32286_octo-quaestionum-maximilianum-caesarem · Latin source / English translation, segment by segment
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This work also has special scholarly renderings for its cipher tables and damaged passages, each shown beside the source facsimile: Recovered untranslated passages.
The book of eight questions of Johannes Trittenheim, Abbot of Sponheim, which the Emperor Maximilian proposed to him for resolution: 1. On faith and understanding. 2. On the faith necessary for salvation. 3. On the miracles of unbelievers. 4. On sacred Scripture. 5. On the reprobate and evildoers. 6. On the power of sorceresses. 7. On divine permission. 8. On the providence of God; a little work ...
Cologne, 1534
P.lat. 1950
Of Ioannes Trittenhemius, Abbot of Sponheim, the book of eight questions, which the Emperor Maximilian proposed to him for resolution.
- On faith and understanding.
- On the faith necessary for salvation.
- On the miracles of unbelievers.
- On sacred Scripture.
- On the reprobate and evildoers.
- On the power of sorceresses.
- On divine permission.
- On the providence of God.
A little work exceedingly useful and delightful, now for the first time set in type.
At Cologne, at the expense of Melchior Novesianus. In the year M.D.XXXIIII [1534].
To the most serene and most unconquered lord of the world, the Emperor Maximilian: the preface of Iohannes Trittenhemius, Abbot of Peapolis, upon the book of eight questions.
I have obeyed your commands, most unconquered Emperor Maximilian, and the eight questions which you proposed to me some time ago, when I had been summoned to your Highness at the castle of Boppard, I have resolved with what brevity I could, and set down in this form of a little book. You wished, moreover (if I remember rightly), that so far as could be done I should follow the way of nature in their solution, for the sake of those who grant less to belief. Yet this did not seem possible to me in all of them, because the matter of the questions in most places rested upon theological rather than natural principles. For even if the Christian religion, among the sects of all mortals, is held to be nearer to the laws of nature, more conformable to them, and closest, nevertheless the principal articles of our faith are not all provable according to the common way of nature.
This we must needs believe was done so that faith too might have its place, and firm belief not lack its own merit. And so, entering as my strength allowed upon a middle path of the disputation commanded me, I have used the testimony partly of nature and partly also of the divine Scriptures. For truly the things which it befits us to believe are not to be rashly sifted by human argumentation, since, as holy Gregory says: faith has no merit where human reason supplies the proof. Therefore with fear of God, and with reverence for our undefiled Christian religion, I have resolved so to answer the questions proposed that I depart from the definitions of the Roman Church neither in jest nor in earnest. Hence whatever I have ever written, or shall write, I wish to be wholly subject to her determination and judgment.
On faith and understanding.
The First Question.
The first question of your most serene Majesty was this: why did almighty God will rather to be believed by mortals than to be known and understood — in that mode, namely, of knowledge and understanding by which he is known and understood by the holy angels?
I remember that I answered this question, put to me in person before your most sacred Majesty, thus: Almighty God — who is intellect without beginning, pure, everlasting, and unchangeable, existing above every position knowable to us, far more perfect than infinite perfections — by his most wise will created from nothing, in the beginning, two intellects, namely the angelic and the human. The angelic, at the beginning of its creation, was made in act with respect to all knowable things, and knew all things; but the human at first stands in potency to all things, yet is ignorant of all things. At the end, however, through many continuous upward motions it will come forth like the angelic, knowing both God and all the things that pertain to the knowledge of the promised co— [the page and chunk end mid-word; catchword "gnitio"; the sentence concludes in the next chunk].
The angelic and the human intellect differ as any two opposites do, such as act and potency, light and darkness, knowledge and ignorance, state and privation, beginning and end, unmoving and moving, substance and accident, truth and likeness, nature and art, health and infirmity, whole and part. For the angelic intellect is as act, light, knowledge, state, beginning, the unmoving, the immediate, simple substance, truth, nature, and the whole. But the human intellect is as potency, darkness, ignorance, privation, end, the moving, the mediate, the composite, accident, likeness, art, and part.
Hence whatever things belong to the angelic intellect from the beginning, these same things are present in the human intellect at the end, after it has laid aside the burden of flesh. For just as beginning and nature perfect the angelic intellect, so the end and art, after many exercises at last, raise the human intellect upward. Therefore between these two intellects there is great inequality from the beginning, although in the end they are at last made equal, when the human intellect will be as great by art as the angelic intellect surpasses it 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, immovably, substantially, and by nature knew all things that it could understand, and that, created in an instant, it came forth full and perfect in all knowledge. But the human intellect, since it was created in all ignorance and privation, and was destined for the body for its own exercise and by degrees, must by continual action, motion, and art come to the 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 forth from mere potency and possibility into essence; from empty it will make it full, from imperfect perfect, from deprived possessed of state, from dark luminous, from nocturnal diurnal, from lunar solar, and from earthly heavenly.
This can never happen while the mind is bound in the body, as the Christ-loving Paul says: “As long as we are in the flesh, we are away from the Lord.” To know God belongs to a pure, simple, and perfect intellect; but the human intellect, so long as it dwells in the body, is impure, mixed, unstable, and imperfect, and for this reason, without faith, wholly ignorant of the knowledge of God and of heavenly things.
The object of each intellect, both human and angelic, is the same: that highest and immutable good, God, the one principle of all things, to which they return by a natural desire for knowledge. But the angelic intellect, if compared with the human, is as nature is to art, and as simple intellect is to reason, which touches the principles of learning; but reason proceeds from principles to conclusions. Hence it is manifest that the angelic intellect immovably apprehends its proper object, to which the human intellect, through the angelic medium, after many exercises of its own, as has been said, at last and at some time makes ready an ascent for itself by reasoning.
The human intellect, however, is separated by the medium of angelic knowledge from the perfection of its natural object, and for that reason necessarily becomes mobile, returning through that medium to its own principle. For every motion is from an extreme through a medium to an extreme; but where there is no medium, the extremes are now immediate and near, and for that reason immovable. But the human intellect, placed as it were in a dark prison, as long as it is held in the body, is moved by sense and reason toward understanding, though confusedly and all too imperfectly, and therefore it suffers a medium between itself and God, which we have called angelic; for the corruptible body, as Wisdom 9 says, is a very great impediment to perfection, as a certain 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 wholly necessary for us to believe God rather than to know or understand him, because it is utterly impossible to know that superdivine and uncircumscribable majesty.
QUESTION ONE
Therefore it was wholly necessary for us to believe God rather than to know or understand him, because it is utterly impossible for that super-divine and 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 affirmation, remains subject neither to the senses of mortals nor to reason, as he is read to have said to Moses: “Man shall not see me and live.” Hence also the divine evangelist John says: “No one has ever seen God.” For since God is the first and everlasting intellect, most pure, most simple, most perfect, immovable, the supreme incomprehensible creator, immeasurable and uncircumscribable far beyond every affirmation, he could not be comprehended by the human intellect, which is impure, subject to composition, imperfect, movable, created, comprehensible, lowest, and established beneath the measure of affirmation.
But as for the question which seemed to arise from the first, whether God, since he is omnipotent, could have made himself knowable to the human intellect, as to the angelic, I say that God can do all things, which no one of sound mind has ever denied. We say that God cannot do those things which imply contradiction, because they are contrary to the order of the unchangeable wisdom that disposes the universe, just as the destruction of a whole thing is undoubtedly contrary to its construction at the same time, if I may speak of things wholly opposed.
For it was neither fitting, nor could it in any way have come to pass, that God should be comprehended by the human intellect; for if mortal man, by the guidance of human nature, comprehended the immortal God, then certainly he would have to be called no longer human or mortal, but an angel; and either man would be compared with God, or God with man. For so long as the angelic intellect intervenes, the human intellect cannot understand God. But it intervenes until the death of the flesh, when the mind, having obtained its natural freedom, will become wholly equal to an angel.
You now see, I believe, most manifestly, Emperor, that it was neither fitting nor possible that the human intellect should comprehend the divine, the created the creator, the temporal the eternal, the changeable the unchangeable, the weak the omnipotent, since of the finite to the infinite, as a certain philosopher says, there is no proportion. And therefore it is necessary for mortals to believe in the immortal God, whom by no manifest reasoning can we comprehend.
Although the order of the whole universe providently declares the author of all things, and we understand that nothing besides him was produced without a beginning, nevertheless what God is and in what manner he is, the human mind cannot grasp, since he is far above all that we can understand concerning him, or anything mortal whatsoever, and is far outside and above every affirmation, as holy Dionysius says. Indeed, he is neither soul nor sense, nor imagination or opinion, nor reason, nor intelligence; nor does he possess reason or intelligence; nor is he spoken of or understood; neither is he number nor multitude, nor order, nor magnitude, nor smallness, nor equality; neither likeness nor unlikeness; neither does he stand nor is he moved; neither does he act rest, nor does he have power, nor is he power; neither is he light, nor does he live, nor is he life; neither is he substance, nor age, nor time; nor is there spiritual contact of him; neither is he form, nor truth, nor kingdom, nor wisdom; neither one nor unity, nor deity or goodness; nor is he spirit, so far as we can know; nor is there for him the denomination of son or father, nor anything else among those things which are known to us or to anyone else in the world; nor is he any of those things which are not, nor any of those things which are; nor do beings know him as he is; nor is there speech of him, nor name, nor knowledge; neither is he darkness nor light, neither error nor truth; nor is there of him any affirmation at all, nor any negation. For he is above every affirmation, the perfect and singular cause of all things. And above every negation is his excellence, that is, of him who is simply absolved from all things and is above all things.
Therefore we say, as Dionysius says, that since as the cause of all things he is above all things, he is neither without substance nor without life, nor does he lack reason or mind; nor is he a body, nor figure, nor form, nor [unclear].
nor does it have quality or quantity or mass; nor is it in a place, nor is it seen; nor does it have sensible touch, nor does it sense, nor is it sensible; nor is it subject to rashness or disturbance, agitated by carnal passions; nor is it weak, subject to sensible things and to accidents; nor does it need light; nor does it admit change or corruption or division or increase; nor is it or has it anything else belonging to sensible things.
Therefore, since it far excels every positive assertion, it could not be comprehended by a creature placed beneath it, which necessarily uses the senses for understanding, as the Peripatetic truly said: Nothing is in our intellect unless it has first been in sense. Therefore God, who is not subject to mortal senses, far exceeds human understanding: according to affirmative position he truly is altogether in all things, and according to negative removal, by which he is approached more nearly, he is none of all the things subject to mortal knowledge. Indeed, since he is above all things, he cannot be any of those things that are subject to him. Therefore Empedocles beautifully gave this likeness, saying: God is a sphere whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere.
Let the human intellect now raise itself as much as it can; and if it strives to comprehend God, let it rightly understand and comprehend the center of this imagined sphere, together with its circumference ending nowhere. But if it is not sufficient to understand this proposition of its own likeness, why does it contend to investigate the essence of God, which exists above every positive assertion?
May it not weary you, most unconquered Caesar, to hear another likeness concerning God from Cusanus, once a cardinal priest of the Roman Church, my fellow Mosellan, a man most learned in those times. He says: God is a straight line of infinite length, which makes a circle. Let us see, then. If the line is straight, 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 things without circumscription, above all things without excluding positive assertions, it was not possible for him to be comprehended by the circumscribable human intellect, which uses the service of the senses for understanding; nor could what is promised to it, when at last purified, in the fatherland, be granted to it while confused and impure on the way. But after our mind, at last released from the flesh, has come to its own center, which is God, clean, simple, pure, perfect, and consummated, then, made equal to the angels, we shall know God perfectly, as Saint Paul says to the Corinthians: Now we see through a mirror and in an enigma; but then face to face.
For this reason we said that the angelic intellect, by the guidance of its nature, cleaves immovably to its own principle, because it is pure act and habit; and since it is simple by natural condition, it cannot be impeded by any commerce with composition. But the human intellect, as has now been sufficiently declared, since it is potency and privation, is impure because of its commerce with its body, and is indeed delayed from perfect act until at last, released from the flesh, it passes into the fellowship of likeness with the angels; then for the first time it is to be admitted to the true knowledge of God. But if in the meantime the affection of love necessary for salvation is joined to present Christian faith and to future divine knowledge, the same everlasting blessedness prepared with the holy angels will be given to the worshippers of God. But if, however, the depraved mind, through too much commerce with its flesh, [unclear] the love of God
...will have despised it, the intellect, released from its prison, will indeed escape to the measure of knowledge naturally suited to it; but it will be so much the more wretched, the more, through evil will, it is found to be like the demons. Therefore, to conclude the solution of the proposed question as I may, I say that it is not possible for almighty God to be perfectly understood by us, so long as we mortals live in the flesh.
On the faith necessary for salvation.
The Second Question.
Since today only a small part of the world is subject to the law of the Christian faith, whether that opinion of very many people seems admissible without injury to the truth: that each person, in his own religion, which he believes to be true and saving, as a worshipper of the one God, outside the Christian faith and without baptism, can be saved, provided that nothing is known to him of the religion of Christ.
To answer this question simply according to the common understanding I have judged superfluous, since I know that today there are many among Christians whose impiety, in favor of the salvation of lost men, makes God out to be cruel. But because a cause of just consideration stirred your Most Serene Highness to ask these things, not because you do not know what must be held in this position according to the Catholic faith, but so that you might have something true to set against those who attack the truth, I shall answer the questions briefly, as best I can.
If anyone could be saved outside the Christian faith, Christ, the Son of almighty God, would seem to have become man superfluously and without cause. For if there is salvation outside Christ, then Christ is not the Savior of all. But because it was necessary that the only-begotten Son of God, for the salvation of the human race, be born as man in the world, suffer, die, and rise again on the third day according to the Scriptures, 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 who is the truth, Jesus Christ, says in the holy Gospel: He who does not believe will be condemned. And again: 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 will not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon him. The holy Apostle 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: salvation is through him, the Savior of the world, and whoever does not believe in him cannot be saved. Nor is it lawful for a Christian in any way to go beyond the boundaries of his religion, so as to presume to explain this question otherwise than Christ has taught. Whoever goes outside this rule of faith by asserting the contrary is plainly shown not to think rightly about 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 believe and without doubt pronounce that no one can be saved outside the faith of Christ, however much he worships one God, however holy or just his life, however much he trusts in his paternal religion or in another. Christ is salvation, and outside the Christian faith no one will be saved. For why would Christ the Son of God have willed to die for the sins of the world, if each...
Could anyone outside his faith have been saved 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. What, then, 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 this in the holy Gospel? “For many are called, but few are chosen.” And again he says: “Enter by the narrow gate, for wide is the gate and spacious is the way that leads to perdition, and many are those who enter by it.”
What do we suppose our salvation can contribute to God, who has no need of good things? For whether many are saved or are damned, God himself is the unchangeable Lord of all. Nothing is added to him if all are saved; nothing is lacking if the whole world perishes. There is an infallible order of divine providence, which embraces those who are to be damned no less than those who are to be saved, each and all alike. Certainly no one among those to be damned suffers injustice, because 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 his own desert through justice.
From what has been set forth there arises another question of no small difficulty, 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 creating so many thousands of men whom he has most certainly foreknown are to be damned? Why does he not spare the wretched, and refrain from bringing forth to destruction, in such great multitude, those whom he foreknew would turn aside to evil? For it would seem better not to exist than to exist badly.
Let him answer this question, if anyone thinks himself God’s counselor. Who am I, that I should explain the cause of the divine will? For the Lord has done all things whatsoever he willed in heaven and on earth, and there is no one who can resist his will. Hence a certain wise man says to God: “Who will charge you with fault if the nations you made perish?” The Almighty established an order of succession in things, which he will never revoke by any regretful change. For just as he permits his sun to rise upon the good and the evil, so until the end of the age he allows men, the pious and the impious, to be conceived, born, and grow.
The thoughts of men are not in God, nor does he change his counsel because of time; but since he is unchangeable and everlasting, willing all things together and once for all, he has from eternity invariably preordained all things. God speaks once, as Sacred Scripture bears witness, and does not add to it, because 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, God permits by a most just reason, he who assigned this order to all things. Nothing perishes to God, who is [unclear] of all, God from God the Father without time, and man from the Virgin in time, appointed mediator of God and men. He is the one through whom we have access to God; he is the savior of all. A man thinks wrongly of him if he rashly concedes that anyone can be saved without Christian faith.
The omnipotence of God has regard to the order of things that he established, according to whose inviolable sequence of rectitude 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 a 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 his judgment is manifestly to the contrary. Let them hear the Savior himself again saying in the Gospel: “No one comes”
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, surely no one will be saved except through him. Who will save the Jew or the pagan, when no one can be saved except through Christ?
But Christ will undoubtedly save only those who believe in him in heart, speech, and deed. He will not save the Jew, nor the Saracen, nor the pagan, nor any other unbeliever, because they do not believe in him, but despise his teaching; they contemn him, and blaspheming his holy name, they scorn him all day long. For he himself said in the Gospel: Whoever is ashamed of me and of my words, I also will put him to shame 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 contrary to 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, He will be condemned; and, No one comes to the Father except through me. But you, seduced by I know not what rashness, thrust forward the contrary, saying that a man outside the faith of Christ, trusting in his paternal religion which he believes to be true and pleasing to God, or living innocently according to the law of nature, especially when perhaps he has never heard anything of the faith of Christ, is to be saved in his own confidence.
Christ did not say this, but that whoever believes in the only-begotten Son of God will be saved, while whoever does not believe will be condemned. He excepted no one; he admitted no condition, for he had come to suffer for all, and by faith alone had provided for the salvation of all. If faith in the Savior is lacking, then no confidence will save the unbeliever. For the holy bishop Augustine said in On Faith to Peter: Hold most firmly, and do not doubt at all, 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 prepared for the devil and his angels.
Now you see where foolish compassion drags you: measuring divine things by human laws, so that you may make God merciful in all things, you 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 false, who hold that anyone 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 called saved. Whoever says the contrary shows that he is not a true and good Christian.
For this is the inviolable judgment of Catholic tradition, which the Lord Jesus himself, the Son of God, defined in the holy Gospel: that no one is to be saved outside his faith, which he himself established, taught, and confirmed with his own blood. Therefore whoever affirms, or believes in his heart, that a man is to be saved in any sect whatever outside the faith of Jesus Christ, is not a good Christian, but rather an apostate and a disciple of Antichrist; with whom, unless he repents, he should know that he will be tormented forever in hell. For he is 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 adhere to him, who thinks that men are to be saved outside the faith of Jesus Christ. For everyone who believes that someone 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 damned, this is not a mark of cruelty but of true piety. For it is better to believe the truth firmly than to agree falsely with a man.
Jews, pagans, gentiles, Saracens, schismatics, heretics, and unbelievers are without doubt to be condemned eternally with the demons: holy Church testifies to this, having taken and confirmed this judgment from no source other than the words of Christ. For thus he said: “He who believes in the Son has eternal life,” by which good Christians are designated in faith and deed. “But he who is unbelieving toward the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon him.” Here are denoted all Jews, pagans, Saracens, gentiles, and all who do not believe in our Lord Jesus Christ.
Concerning schismatics and heretics, however, Christ’s judgment is plain in the Gospel, where he says: “If he refuses to hear the Church, let him be to you as a gentile and a publican.” Gentiles are heathens, and publicans are manifest and public sinners; and holy Church has no doubt at all concerning their damnation. For what Christian would doubt that gentiles and enormous, manifest sinners are to be damned? Since, therefore, all schismatics and heretics despise holy Church, they are most rightly said to be like the gentiles and publicans who are to be damned for their crimes and demerits; and they will justly undergo equal punishments of everlasting damnation with them. Behold, those whom the just sentence of Christ the Savior has condemned, the foolish compassion of men, not to say impious cruelty, presumes 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 has assigned to death by justice, they assert, with the worst presumption, are to be recalled to life. It is neither good nor useful for a Christian, whether seriously or in jest, to contradict Christ. He is impious, not Christian, who says that any unbelievers are to be saved.
In Adam, the first man, when he fell, 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, God and man, innocent of sin; he voluntarily underwent the death of the cross and, having been made 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, but 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 save one who denies the faith without faith. No one is saved unwillingly, because no one believes except willingly. For the Lord knows those who are his, since he saves those who believe in the Son through repentance, but condemns unbelievers by the justice of justice.
Hence, when the way has been closed, a new question knocks at the mind: what is to be thought about the infants and simple-minded persons 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 unbelief of their parents. The judgment concerning the simple-minded of different religions is similar: just as we believe without doubt that baptized simple-minded Christians are to be saved, so we say without doubt that those of unbelievers are to be damned.
Again, it is asked here what is to be thought in a catholic manner about those men who inhabit the newly discovered islands in the great sea, of which there is no mention among the ancient cosmographers, and who, as we have been informed, have never heard anything at all about the Christian religion. A brief answer, conformable in all respects to the things written above, is given: the truth has made absolutely no exception from damnation for anyone who does not believe, neither an islander, nor one adjoining our world, nor anyone else, whether dwelling near or far away, but without distinction and without defining persons,
He concluded, saying: “He who has believed and has been baptized will be saved; but he who has not believed 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, though innocent, tasted death?
Since, therefore, no one is saved without faith, we cannot promise salvation to those ignorant of Christ, whom it is clear do not have the piety of faith in him. Necessarily, then, 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. But this one thing we grant: if any among those who are ignorant of Christ have lived well according to the law of nature, calling upon one God, even if they have sometimes sinned, provided they did penance before death, they have been damned, or are to be damned, less grievously than those who either hear of Christ and despise him, or who among either sort have lived wickedly and foully. For God is just; he does injury to no one, but renders to each according to his works.
But the wrath of God remains upon everyone who does 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. Original sin, if it is in a human being alone, as in little children, unless it is removed through Christ, condemns the one who has it to the punishment of loss only, by which he is barred forever from the vision of God and from the enjoyment of the blessedness of the saints. But an adult who sins mortally will be punished after death with a twofold punishment, namely of loss and of sense, so that he neither sees God nor ever escapes, feeling without end the pains of the fire of Gehenna.
Moreover, Jews and Saracens, and all the rest who hear and despise the faith of Christ, are without doubt damned to both punishments, of loss and of sense, whether otherwise they live innocently according to the law of nature or the contrary. But among those who have never had any hearing of Christ, if any lived innocently according to the law of nature up to death, I do not think they have given cause for them to be said or believed to be damned to the punishment of sense, although they are deprived forever of the vision of God, which theologians have called the punishment of loss. For no one will behold the face of God the almighty Father unless he has been reborn through faith in Christ.
Now let us bring our judgment to a conclusion against those who, when we set forth these things catholicly according to Christ’s doctrine, object with foolish reflection: Why did almighty God, since he is supremely good, will to create so many thousands of human beings whom from eternity he foreknew would be damned? For if Christians are compared with unbelievers, scarcely a twentieth part of the people of the whole world today believes in our Lord Jesus Christ. The immeasurable curiosity of this question has often troubled many; if their faith in Christ were firm, and their devotion fervent in love of him, they would not seek such unusual and difficult things. For what man of such great learning or holiness is found among mortals that, apart from God himself, he could disclose to us the cause of the divine will? For the cause of God’s will is incomprehensible, since he himself is the cause of his own most righteous will, the eternal and inviolable order; and, as I said above, God does injury to no one.
When God brought the universal flood upon the earth, were not only eight human beings saved in the ark, while all the rest perished in the inundation of waters? The cause of their perishing was sin; but that they were created had no other cause than the uncircumscribable goodness of God. That few were saved while many perished was a preceding figure, a mystery, and Noah’s ark was a sacrament of the Christian faith. For just as outside Noah’s ark all perished in the flood, so now every
All who are outside the unity of the catholic Christian Church will without doubt perish eternally in their sins: Jews and pagans, heretics likewise and schismatics. The justice of God condemns those whom his goodness created. His mercy saves those whom grace has confirmed, because, 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. Let us weigh rightly the freedom of human choice, and we shall know the just will of God.
On the Miracles of Unbelievers.
The Third Question.
Your most serene Majesty’s third question was this: if no one is saved outside the faith, whence come miracles among unbelievers, since by the report of many we have learned that supernatural things occur among unbelievers? The solution of this question, as it seems to me, will not be difficult, if we apply both faith in the Scriptures and the necessary consideration of the natural powers of the soul. A miracle is a new and unusual event, which happens beyond custom and draws human beings into wonder. Hence good Christians work miracles in one way, evil Christians in another, and unbelievers in another. Good Christians indeed work miracles through public righteousness; evil Christians, through signs of public righteousness; but unbelievers through private contracts with demons, namely implicit or explicit ones. Concerning the good 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 hurt them,” [unclear] so that a necessary distinction between light and darkness might be maintained.
I find four producers of wonders, but I acknowledge one alone who truly works miracles in the principal sense: God, as the cause of all good things. Therefore the first and greatest producer of all wonders is God, who has filled and illumined the whole world with signs, miracles, and powers. None of the others is to be compared with him, who created heaven and earth, the sea, and all things that are in them; who alone is almighty, just, holy and upright, good, incomprehensible, greatest, glorious, immense, and everlasting. All other things are beneath him, since whatever can occur wondrously in this world is certainly less than the whole world itself, which he was able to create out of nothing. Likewise every miracle 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 image and likeness.
And although the miracles of God in visible natures have now, among mortals, almost become commonplace through the constancy of seeing them, nevertheless, if we look upon them wisely, they will appear greater and rarer than all unusual things. Now the manner in which God works miracles is the unchangeable will of God, by which, since he is almighty, he does all things whatsoever he has willed in heaven and [unclear].
THIRD QUESTION,
in heaven and on earth. For he spoke and they were made; he commanded and they were created. The ordained will of God is everlasting, and therefore his miracles are incomparably greater than all others. For greater than all the miracles of this world is what we see: the whole universe, and whatever is contained in it, created by the will of God. The divine will works all things, persevering unchangeably, since it lacks both beginning and end. But whatever God wills, he always wills; for since in him to will and to be able are the same, labor has no place with the unchangeable one.
Therefore all the universal miracles that the Creator of all things performs he has set forth for both good and evil people to behold; and after those general miracles, which by now have grown cheap among mortals through familiarity, he has shown in almost every individual creature infinite things specially worthy of wonder.
The second worker 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 into ministry for the faithful; and they provide to both good and evil people those things that are benefits of nature, but to those alone who believe in God and in our Lord Jesus Christ they administer the gifts of saving grace. Therefore there is no doubt that the wonders and miracles which are done in the Church by invocation of the divine name are displayed through their ministry and cooperation.
But the wonders of unbelievers, if any either happen today or are read to have happened formerly, are either fabricated, or feigned, or carried out by the deception of demons. For it cannot be that unbelievers should perform miracles through the ministry of good angels, because where Christ Jesus, the Son of God, is not believed in, 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 anything miraculous, there is no room at all 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 contemner 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 by this we do not deny that every human being is entrusted to some good spirit, through whose ministry, even if he is unbelieving toward the Son of God, he receives the benefits of nature, though he does not attain to the gifts of grace. But to those who believe in our Lord Jesus Christ they grant not only the benefits of nature, but also minister the gifts of grace.
It is therefore clear that if any miracles occur among unbelievers, they cannot occur by God’s gift or by the ministry of the holy angels, since all such people 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 cannot please God; and so, if any wonders are done at their prayers, they should be believed to have been performed not by God’s power nor by the ministry of angels, but rather by the agency of demons.
The third worker of wonders is the devil, who, like an ape, longs to imitate whatever he sees; and he deceives the minds of men, especially of unbelievers, with various illusions, and seduces those who believe him with a certain likeness of miracles. For I do not judge it difficult for demons to be able to delude the senses of men, since it is agreed that by nature they were created subtler than all mortals. But they cannot know the thoughts of mortals except by a kind of conjecture, namely when we make our inward things manifest by certain signs. Demons foretell future things, and sometimes speak truths.
Sometimes, when they make conjectures, they deceive and are deceived. From the beginning of the world they have known certain signs that precede events; by experience and use of these they sometimes foretell truly what is to come. For when they see signs known to them that precede an event, they at once conjecture what is in a man’s thought. Yet they often deceive, because they themselves are deceived.
For when they are asked about some matter, as, for example, when a messenger has been sent far away, how soon or on what day he will return, they immediately, in the blink of an eye, arrive at the place where they know him to be. When they have seen that he has already begun the journey back, they carefully count the days’ journeys, and, suddenly returning to the questioner, confidently affirm the certain day on which the absent man will come. But if he either suffers delay on the road or turns aside elsewhere, then the demons, deceived in their judgment, must necessarily be mistaken.
They willingly mix themselves into prophecies and are quite ready to foretell future things to human beings for the sake of honor and esteem, because they greatly desire to be regarded as worthy of admiration, they seek divine honors, and they strongly long to be feared by mortals. Just as boys, hiding in secret places or running about in masks, 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, and when they see the frightened ones unaware of them, they glory as though they had gained great honor from this; so, after their example, certain demons, more closely bound to the earth and very restless around human beings, whom the ancients called Bacucei, frighten people at night and seek nothing more from mortals than the esteem of divinity.
Hence, before those to whom they are permitted to appear under the likeness of something [unclear], they sometimes perform various mockeries, and make themselves appear terrible in people’s minds, as occasion allows, whenever they can. They gladly put on the likeness of a human body, but they do not always find suitable airy matter from which to clothe themselves. Therefore they often appear monstrous and horrible, because they have not had suitable moistures or vapors for the perfection of the appearance they desired. Moreover, the more they are bound to earthly dwelling places, the more, through contact with matter, they have become dull. Hence, because of the ignorance they contracted through disobedience, the predictions of demons are often false, although by divine permission they are sometimes also verified.
For, as that most holy John Chrysostom says: it is granted to the devil sometimes to speak the truth, so that he may commend his lie by rare truth; for if he never told the truth, he could deceive no one, and his deception would by no means suffice for tempting. It is therefore no wonder if demons sometimes seem to foretell true things to unbelieving people, since they were once able to offer prophecies among the Gentiles in idols. Nor is it any wonder if they sometimes provide care for the sick, since they know the natures of all herbs, and can easily apply what is prepared to the sick, either removing diseases which they had previously inflicted, or withdrawing for a time from the senses those which they inflict by their causes.
Indeed, almighty God, by the rightful authority of the imperial majesty of the universe, uses even the ministry of demons, both for the testing of the faithful and for the punishment of the impious. Since they are perverted in affection, obstinate and proud in their rebellion, they greatly desire divine esteem and honors; and therefore they gladly answer the invocations of unbelievers, which they are accustomed to pour out to their gods, as though they themselves were gods. They also seem among unbelievers to raise the dead to life, and they show wonders to curious people, so that they may make them, confirmed by miracles, altogether obstinate in their former error. But they do not truly raise the dead.
They raise them, but they deceive human senses in various ways: for either they themselves enter dead corpses and move those very bodies about as though alive, or, after carrying them off to a more remote place, they present to the beholders something to be seen in the appearance of a likeness of the dead person as living, as the experience of certain people has informed us. We believe it manifest that demons can show, in a certain false likeness, everything whatever 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 men experienced in the more hidden mysteries of nature, by a certain application of matter to form unknown to others, produce unusual and marvelous effects, such as forming natural eels from the dew of heaven, bees from the flesh of calves, serpents from certain roots of a plant, and many things similar to these, not to mention greater things, as we have [unclear] in very many cases, who would deny that demons, being of a subtler nature and greater experience, can perform more marvelous natural things which are manifest to no man?
The fourth worker of miracle is man, who works marvelous things in four ways, things 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 the merit of accepted holiness concurs in the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ. In this way the holy apostles and their imitators worked miracles by the power of God and at the same time by the merit of holiness in the unity of faith. But unbelievers cannot work miracles in this way, for they do not walk the necessary path of faith toward salvation. For although very many of them believe in God, yet because they refuse to believe in the mediator between God and men, they have gone very far away from the mercy of God.
But, according to the promise of the holy Gospel, all things are possible to those who believe in God and our Lord Jesus Christ, that is, to those who adorn right faith also with holy works. For truly, just as without faith it is impossible to please God, so also faith without works is dead. Almighty God would grant us all things that we ask in the faith of Christ, if we did all things according to the faith we owe. Believe firmly, and act faithfully, and you will always obtain all things.
Second, man works miracles by likeness to angelic purity. For the purer our mind, confirmed in the faith of Jesus Christ, has become through love, the more like the holy angels it is made, and the greater familiarity with them it will attain. But whoever has attained every kind of familiarity with the holy angels will, whenever he wishes, shine forth in miracles, by God’s gift. For the holy angels reveal to pure men who burn with 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. Whoever is united with Christ through grace is refreshed by the frequent visitation of angels; and as often as necessity demands, he is made illustrious by signs and powers through their ministry.
This is why those oppressed by various illnesses also betake themselves to the aid of the saints; and, turning over in their minds the promises of the Lord, they obtain by the merits of others what they cannot obtain by their own. Their holy devotion in the faith of Christ receives salvation from the Lord, because, aided by the purity of their own conscience and supported by the merit of another’s holiness, it rises, not rashly, in sure hope.
Miracles are done in the Church of God by divine power in a threefold respect or means. For sometimes Almighty God works a miracle through the ministry of angels, solely by the merits of the worker himself, just as Saint Martin healed a blind man and a lame man against their will. Sometimes...
when miracles occur by the merit of the sufferer alone, just as we read that many were healed by bad Christians whom the sick believed to be excellent in faith. Third, there is no doubt that such healings occur by the merit of both, that is, of the sufferer and of the worker together, as Christ says to someone in the holy Gospel: If you can believe, all things are possible to one who believes. For faith is so necessary for a miracle that our Lord Jesus Christ, when he came into his own country, marveled because he could not do any mighty work there because of their unbelief. But none of these things takes place among unbelievers, where neither holiness is found in the worker nor orthodox faith in the sufferer.
Therefore, third, a man works miracles through the cooperation of the devil out of wickedness. And this can happen in three ways: by manifest invocation of demons, by implicit involvement, and by substitution. By manifest invocation, necromancers and the little women whom we commonly call witches do wondrous things; corrupted by likeness of will, they have passed into fellowship with 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 tokens of a pact between a man and a malignant spirit.
Hence, when sorceries bear the signs of demons, the malignant spirits invoked are accustomed readily to come, and to display horrible sorceries and at the same time certain wondrous things. But witches and necromancers produce wondrous effects by the invocation of demons in different ways. Witches are subjected to demons by a certain kind of profession; by their ministry they disturb the air, raise storms, lay waste crops, and make men and beasts sick. They carry on foul dealings of the filthiest lust with demons, and by destructive spells call back from the underworld into sight whomever they wish. Their deeds should not be called miracles, but rather sorceries, and they deserve to be punished with the ultimate penalty.
Necromancers, however, subject themselves to demons not by manifest profession but by implicit condition, when they promise to compel them to appear visibly in a circle not only by conjurations and the display of characters, but also by sacrifices, fumigations, and vows. Their crimes are infinite, since it is clear that they all conspire into fellowship with demons, either implicitly or explicitly. And although necromancers are not all equal either in art or in work, nevertheless, to their own destruction, they are all united in damnable curiosity, because they desire to attain by the help of demons what they cannot discover naturally. All their works and volumes are full of superstitions and impiety, and for that reason they must be driven far from the borders of believers.
There is a great multitude of enchanters and necromancers in the East, who miserably deceive the human race by their illusions and long ago turned almost all Asia, both Greater and Lesser, away from the faith of Christ. Illusions can be produced in three ways: by the ministry of demons, by the operation of nature, and by the deception of human art. No true Christian doubts that the miracles of unbelievers occur in one of these ways, when the definite root of the worker is established.
Today, moreover, there are many among Christians devoted to the works of demons: enchanters, witches, and men reprobate concerning the faith, who deceive many by excessive curiosity and promise impossibilities by their arts. By implicit involvement of demons, however, wondrous things sometimes occur whenever, that is, a man not sufficiently and rightly grounded in the faith does or desires something other than befits a Christian, even if he does not believe it to be any sin; and although this ought not to happen, nevertheless the devil, intruding himself, often supplies the desired thing.
Such, for instance, is the thing that those afflicted with spasms commonly use. On the holy day of Parasceve they make a ring of some metal during the office, and thereafter they always wear it on the heart-finger. These are utterly vain things, having no root at all in truth. Yet I cannot deny that I have seen some people cured of spasm by that same vanity. Likewise, I know that certain people have opened the strongest locks by words and herbs, which I do not think was done either by the power of God or by the force of the things applied.
I could bring forward countless similar things that I have seen and heard; their manifest effects are nothing other than certain marvels of demons. Finally, there are some overly curious people who stubbornly put faith and confidence in characters, little written sheets, rings, figures, necklaces, and unknown words, and often obtain astonishing effects. We do not doubt at all that the devil supplied these, not through any merit of holiness, nor by God’s merciful grant, but rather through faithless credulity.
For demons, having the greatest envy of the human race, gladly assist the vain works of the impious in order to destroy the souls of mortals. For what else were characters and interpretations of hidden names but certain foods and drinks of 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 their superiors, use many and various superstitions in their daily actions, by which implicit pacts with demons are entered into, to the insult of the Christian faith and to their own condemnation.
And because these evils have now multiplied too much among Christians, the Almighty has withdrawn his hand and handed them over to the power of the faithless, so that they may feel them as exactors of punishments, since by imitation they were stubbornly serving not the living and true God but vain superstitions.
That marvelous things are done by the substitution of demons we shall clearly recognize if we inquire more diligently into the truth. Jews, Saracens, pagans, or gentiles, who do not believe in our God Jesus Christ, if they perform any miracles, we believe that they are done 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 whenever they invoke almighty God, in whose only-begotten Son they do not believe, for the merciful granting of some marvelous effect, the devil, knowing that there is no salvation for sinners, and that the Most High does not hear unbelieving sinners, secretly applies himself in place of the God invoked, so that he may keep them stubborn in their errors; and, if he can, with the Lord permitting it, he grants to their prayers what is asked.
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 he thrusts himself upon those who invoke them in place of God. Hence, blinded in their errors, they invoke God, in whose Son they do not believe; and when he disdains to hear them while they remain under wrath, the devil, the false worker of miracles, comes near. Thus they believe the devil’s deceptions, while they scorn to believe the true miracles of God. From demons they receive false miracles suited to their errors, because they have refused to believe the truth, that is, Christ.
For there are many among the unbelievers who worship 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 mysteries of the Lord’s incarnation, the wrath of God remains upon them; and they vanish away in their follies, thinking God near to them, while, since they do not believe rightly, they are subjected to demons. Therefore, putting faith in false miracles...
Those who believe are confirmed in their errors by a lie. To illustrate this matter, let it not be irksome to introduce a comparison.
There was a certain man, a keeper of pigs, who had enclosed in a staff a little written slip containing the name of the holy martyr Blasius. He put so much faith in it that, when the staff was fixed in the ground in the midst of the herd, he believed every wolf to be barred from approaching. When this foolish confidence had at last been strengthened by long experience, the man went wherever he wished in security, leaving the pigs in the wood without danger, since no wolf now had any access to them.
It happened, while the shepherd was absent, that a certain man with sight passed by; seeing that a demon had charge of the herd, he said to him, “Wretch, what are you doing here?” He answered, “I am guarding these pigs.” The other said, “Who entrusted you with the care of the pigs?” He answered again, “The shepherd’s foolish confidence. For he thinks that a certain slip enclosed in a staff has great power, by which, through the merits of some Blasius, wolves are kept 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 the man lose his confidence, guard his pigs, and willingly put myself in Blasius’s place.” “Thus,” he said, “mortals trouble us with vain conjurations, so that, unless we wish to lose our reputation and honor among them, we must very often come to the aid of foolish invocations.”
In a likeness of this fact, demons deceive wretched unbelievers, and the miracles that they ask of God when they pray are quite often obtained by the substitution of a more malignant spirit. For in matters that concern either the worship or the honor of God, demons willingly thrust themselves in; and since they cannot obtain open honors, they are of course delighted with hidden ones.
At the same time it must be noted that, from the beginning of the world, miracles of special excellence have never been lacking to any religion or sect, although not all have been done from one principle. For whatever miracles have been done in the true religion have been done from no other source than God. The law of nature had its miracles; the written law had its miracles; and now grace likewise has its miracles. The almighty God who gave religion also performs miracles. But in false religions, where 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 does not establish false religions, and therefore he has never adorned a lie with his miracles.
Muhammad, who, filled with an evil demon, established a false religion, adorned it with false miracles not from God but by the cooperation of demons. For the demon who gave the cause of error could also, when the occasion was taken, display a false miracle to the deceived. Hence, if miracles had been wholly lacking to Muhammad as he persuaded an uncultivated people to a new religion, perhaps no one would have put faith in him. For he too, both by the subtlety of his mind and by the cooperation of the devil, showed certain wonders to the peoples, so that he might seem to have confirmed a new doctrine also by new miracles.
Miracles were not lacking even to pagan idolaters, if we do not deny the histories. The Jews, however, before the incarnation of the Son of God, receiving his law through Moses, were frequently illumined by divine miracles. But 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 perform any wonders today, they are the works of demons and manifest signs of error. For demons keep 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 continuing their fraud, make obstinate in error even unto death. Indeed, when God for just reason withdraws his grace from unbelievers, their deceiver, the malignant spirit, approaches unrecognized; and when he sees that salvation is far away, he presents himself by false miracles as though he were the Lord present.
Therefore whatever miracles belong to unbelievers are works of the demon, since, just as there is no salvation for mortals outside the unity of the Christian faith, so without Christ the most holy power of miracles is not granted. For now the demons, long since conquered and confounded by the trophy of Christ, fear to appear openly since the incarnation of the Lord, and therefore among unbelievers they falsely present themselves as good spirits.
There are also some who add a fourth mode to the three already described, saying that the mind, or spirit, of man himself can naturally perform wonders, provided only that it knows how to withdraw itself from every adventitious thing into itself, above sense, into unity. For those who maintain such things promise wonders of nature: to predict the future, disclose men’s secrets, take away diseases, and suddenly alter men’s plans. But this 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 necessarily intervene, and either a good angel or an evil spirit must in part take possession of the one who is thinking. But if none of the external powers mingles itself within, then the one prophesying must necessarily form the ground of his speech either from conjectures or from bold presumption, and at times pronounce a true judgment, at times a false one.
Indeed, so long as the spirit dwells in the body, it naturally understands nothing without the ministry of sense. Therefore I would not wholly resist them if they grant that our confused and crude understanding is aided by a like ministry. For we see in those who, in contemplation, often pass beyond the measure of the flesh through inward love and desire for Jesus, that they are lifted upward from the earth into the air; and we think that they overcome bodily weight not merely by their own keenness of mind, but also by divine power. Thus the three principles of the opinion mentioned, unknown to many, in my judgment satisfy few, namely that the mind, while placed in the body, should by its own proper power produce wonderful effects outside itself.
For what then? Let anyone ignorant of nature tell me whether bodily weight can be lightened by the operation of the mind. I speak of a thing I experienced, with two others bearing witness with me. When, as a youth, I was pursuing literary studies, four of us were sleeping one night in one bed. A boy of my own age rose from beside me while asleep and, as was his habit, went about the whole house with his eyes closed, while the full moon shone in, almost as if awake. He climbed walls and surpassed the agility of cats. Still asleep, he crossed over the second roof and [unclear], trod on all of us with his feet, and we felt his weight no more than if a little mouse had touched us. Wherever his sleeping body moved, all the fastenings of the doors at once opened of themselves. He passed through the higher parts of the house with the greatest speed, and, like a sparrow, clung upon the roofs.
I speak of things seen, not heard by vague report. These seem to be functions of the soul, not of the body; by its natural power, so to speak, it uses them almost freely when, the senses of the flesh being bound, it wanders outside the dwelling of the body. But since this matter does not in every respect suit the proposed question, I shall defer the treatment of the causes of these marvels to another time. For we do not think these wonders strange to the wise, who have very well understood the power and nobility of the human mind, since, hindered only by the interposition of the body, it is in some respect judged equal to the angels. Finally, we pass over the various modes and kinds of fascinations, by which a mind driven to frenzy works very threatening effects upon external things. The imagination of one who is most strongly confident can also do much toward producing marvelous effects, whether it is directed toward a true object or toward one merely supposed. Hence, since there are so many kinds and modes of working wonders, it is not surprising if Jews,
Jews, Saracens, pagans, gentiles, and others placed outside the faith of Christ, whatever unbelievers they may be, who cannot perform miracles through public righteousness, carry out wonders either by the aid of demons or by artful skill. Nor am I unaware that by the same argument the miracles of the saints are attacked by the impious, as though they were not done by the power of the Creator, but rather by the involvement 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 stubbornly thinks the contrary, he shows himself to be an unbeliever, not a Christian.
On Sacred Scripture.
The fourth question of your most serene Majesty was this: why almighty God did not give holy Scripture, containing the mysteries of our faith in both the New and the Old Testament, open, manifest, uniform in all things, and plainly sufficient for everything, but rather wrapped up and, in many places, full of riddles. For many things necessary for the fuller perfection of faith are not found sufficiently expressed in the divine Scriptures.
To this most sacred question of your Majesty it seems that this answer should be given: every Scripture inspired by God 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 of which we speak is the work of God, it is necessary to confess that it is perfect in all things. For God, the supreme judge, whose works are all perfect, conferred upon his Scriptures, in order, what he willed and as he willed; and he undoubtedly infused into those who received them what they were to write.
Nor did almighty God give to sacred Scripture such authority and majesty that, in comparison with it, all the words of this world would not fail, since divine things cannot properly be comprehended by human speech. Therefore divine Scripture, which on the surface of its verses appears confused to the ignorant, seems clear to those who know it; and unless one reads it in that Spirit by which it is believed to have been infused into men, one by no means reaches its true understanding.
The learned man who burns under the shadow of the flesh and with vain desires reads it in one way; the man whom the love of God truly inflames, stripped of pleasures, understands it in another. Hence it is no wonder if men who think carnally do not understand the divine Scriptures, since, blinded by the pleasures of the flesh, they have never perceived the sweetness of the Spirit of God.
It is just as if you were to show to a boy learning the first elements of letters some written volume whose script was unlike that of his own little book: when he could not read it, he would at once cry out that the writing was bad and not properly formed. In the same way, men who approach the reading of the divine Scriptures while thinking only carnally, and who do not grasp the things that belong to the Spirit of God, weighed down by faults and by rashness, although they ought to have blamed their own ignorance and unworthiness, reproach the holy Scriptures because they do not understand them.
For it is not lawful for everyone indiscriminately to interpret the divine Scriptures, lest the beast that touches the mountain be overwhelmed with stones. Now many arise, in a perverse order, who have spent the whole time of their life on humane letters, and when they have become old men, by wrongly interpreting the divine Scriptures which they have never learned, they do not unfold them but confound them, and examine them according to their own meaning. From this
FOURTH QUESTION
Whoever does not understand the sacred Scriptures in the spirit in which they were infused into their writers has the veil of ignorance and rashness spread over his heart, after the manner of the Jews, and very often drinks in the poison of pernicious error from the place where the humble, approaching in the spirit of God, have received the cup of salvation.
For heavenly doctrine lies not in the words of Scripture, but in the meaning; not on the surface of the sayings, but in the understanding; not in the mere adornment of polished speech, but in the hidden mystery of divine inspiration.
Hence blessed Pope Gregory says: “Sacred Scripture far surpasses all the sciences of this world in the manner of its speech, because in one and the same discourse, while it narrates the text, it reveals a hidden mystery; and just as it refreshes the simple on the surface, so it exercises the wise by its mystery. For it has in public what may nourish little ones, and it preserves in secret what may hold the minds of the lofty suspended in wonder at its sweetness, like some wonderful river in which both the simple 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 height it mocks the proud, by its depth it terrifies the attentive, by its power it feeds the great, and by its affability it nourishes little ones.”
For the authority of sacred Scripture is greater than all the insight of human intelligence. Therefore, in order to arrive at its true understanding, the mind must first be cleansed of every carnal affection, and the help of divine goodness must be earnestly implored with humility, that by his Spirit he may enlighten the understanding of the learner. For to the authority of the divine Scriptures the necks of all powers must be bowed. And as blessed Jerome says: “No man must ever be flattered in such a way that the truth of the holy Scriptures is neglected”; for in both Testaments it is wholly true in its narration of deeds, right in its admonitions, certain in its promises, and terribly to be feared in its threats.
Therefore it is not given to all to be able to penetrate the mysteries of the divine Scriptures, but this is permitted only to those in whom love makes study continual, and to whose purified minds the Spirit of God grants true understanding. But whoever is soiled by the darkness of vices, whoever walks proudly with a swollen mind, whoever doubts the truth of God’s Scriptures either in part or in whole, should never trust that he can reach an understanding of them. For the authority of Scripture itself says: “Unless you believe, you will not understand.”
It is the slowness of our intelligence, and the impurity of our desire, whenever we do not rightly understand the divine Scriptures; since the veil of pernicious occupation remains spread over our hearts and does not allow us to arrive at true understanding. Hence it comes about that we do not understand the meaning which the Holy Spirit infused into the divine Scriptures, but, grasping only the bare words of the writers, we twist them into another sense.
Indeed, if our minds were cleansed from carnal vices; if, through the continual practice of sobriety, our intelligence were exercised in the Scriptures; if faith and reverence were shown to the holy Scriptures as their dignity requires, every studious person would understand more clearly than light that there is nothing confused in the sacred readings, nothing discordant, nothing unfitting, nothing absurd, nothing inserted without the most just reason.
For every passage of divine Scripture is full of mysteries; and whenever anything in them seems to be set down obscurely, it was done by divine providence, so that the studious mind might have the necessary exercise of devotion, and the faith of the simple might not lose the place of due reverence. Therefore it was not by chance, but by eternal providence, that God wished the holy Scriptures to be obscure in many places, so that they might abound in as many mysteries as meanings, to be explained in a Catholic manner by teachers under the inspiration of the Spirit of God. For, as Augustine says, the obscurity of divine Scripture is very useful.
It is useful and very profitable because it brings forth many true meanings and brings them to light for human beings; when one person draws out this sense, and another draws out another, while expounding it in a catholic way, it becomes known how lofty and deep it is. Therefore no man swollen with secular learning should think that he understands sacred Scripture unless he first lays aside the veil of pride and of every disordered desire. For secular learning is more effective for exercising the intellect than for enlightening the understanding toward true wisdom.
Therefore divine Scripture is, without doubt, clear and bright to minds purified by the continual exercise of the fear of God and by frequent zeal for reading; but to filthy minds, and to those puffed up with secular wisdom, it seems confused and obscure. Hence he understands the holy Scriptures well and rightly who, with purified affection and frequent in the study of them, expounds them as did the one who wrote them. For if they read them in a spirit other than that by which he is believed to have inspired them to be written, the mind must be wholly shut out from the true understanding. But when we encounter some discordance in them, let us understand that it is only of words, not of meanings; and that this arises not by chance, but by the providence of God and in due order, so that the mind, exercised in the Scriptures, may be strengthened the longer and not grow wholly sluggish. For the counsel of God cannot be mistaken; but the divine Scriptures were written according to the counsel of his will. It necessarily follows that they are true and in no way false.
They were human beings by whom the divine Scriptures were handed down to us; certainly they wrote words used according to human custom, by which they might signify to posterity what that supreme excellence of divinity wished to be known to mortals.
Therefore you now, who, devoted to secular wisdom, attack the divine Scriptures, speak: the Scripture of the New and Old Testament, which the Church of Christians has received and venerates as true, authentic, and holy, 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, while believing it to be inspired by God, most plainly resists the divine ordering. But if it is from human beings, why do you hope in it for the promised eternal salvation, which a human being cannot give? Unless perhaps, in your madness, you go on to say that all things are fabricated, and that nothing remains after death except ashes, and that the mind perishes together with the body; this profession would show you 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 become apostates into a reprobate mind, you say they were composed by human beings, you impiously show how far you are from true wisdom, wandering in darkness.
You openly show yourselves to be unskilled and rash judges, since you condemn a Scripture that you do not understand. Truly, 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 unskilled. This one thing I want you to know: no one understands unless he receives; but because you place the filth of your affections in the way, so that you may not receive, you therefore do not have the true understanding of wisdom. For almighty God deigns to enlighten by grace those who, stripped of carnal desires, burn with the fire of inward love, who desire nothing in this world except God. The Spirit of God, by his presence, brings help to those whom he finds rooted in the love of truth, and, purified from every foreign thing, he leads them into the knowledge of all things. For truly, to those who love God, all things are open, all things bare, all things manifest; for whoever, through love, beholds in the faith of Jesus Christ the one who creates and governs all things, [unclear] all things that are necessary for his salvation.
knows mysteries. But God’s illumination dwells very far from the slothful, the wicked, gluttons, the envious, the greedy, lechers, the filthy, the lustful, murderers, the impious, the proud, and those estranged from piety, leaving them to the judgment of the avenging demon, who, striking with the sharp point of cruel fire, afflicts sense and mind, and arms and drives the impious still more to commit crimes, so that, guilty of a more shameful fault, they may also become liable to a sharper punishment. Hence, entangled in vices and worldly desires, they not only cannot penetrate the divine Scriptures with understanding, but, neglecting themselves, do not even know themselves.
Since, therefore, sacred Scripture is God’s perfect work, we must so strengthen our mind that we believe it true, right, whole, 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 things, and whole, the Christian faith would be deprived of its foundation. Every Christian must therefore take the greatest care lest, by scrutinizing the divine Scriptures more than is fitting, he overstep the bounds of piety; for the author of Scripture is not man, but the Holy Spirit, and whoever struggles against the integrity of God’s Scriptures is convicted of resisting his ordering.
Now Scripture, by God’s ordinance, is beneficially interwoven with parables, riddles, likenesses, and comparisons of figures, 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 and not to the words alone, we shall understand that all things have been ordered rightly and properly. For it was not fitting that the sacred Scriptures, in which knowledge of the divine majesty is handed down, should be so plain and manifest that they would be understood everywhere by everyone, since they are set forth to be understood only by the good and holy, not also by evil, filthy, and polluted minds.
For this reason it is written: “The beast that touches the mountain shall be stoned.” What is designated here by the beast, except 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, except the height of the divine Scriptures? When the beast approaches this holy mountain, it is overwhelmed with stones, because a person impure in mind, or weak in faith, who attempts to search out the height of the divine Scriptures without a teacher handing it down, is wounded by various and pernicious errors as though by blows of stones. For just as all things are clean to the clean, so all things seem profane to the profane.
God therefore set his hiding place in the height of the Scriptures, which is so inaccessible and closed to the reprobate that it nevertheless always lies plainly open to the saints. But why did almighty God not give holy Scripture as sufficient and manifest for everything that concerns 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 declared by the other. Hence, if we find anything in the holy Scriptures expressed less sufficiently concerning the rules of faith, we at once have recourse to the Church; and where the Church has need of saving instruction for piety, it immediately turns to Scripture. From this it follows that neither would the Church have authority without Scripture, nor Scripture faith without the Church, so that from the two one judgment may be made. 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.” Sacred Scripture, moreover, confirms
The Church also, and in like manner, confirms this from Scripture. The Church abounds whenever Scripture falls short; and if anyone has doubts about the Church, he 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 Spirit who alone inspired Scripture. And this is the threefold cord that is not easily broken, where divine Scripture, through the same Spirit, is joined to the authority of the Church, and so prevails that the Church commends Scripture, and Scripture in turn commends the Church.
Therefore, as it seems to me, O Caesar, we have sufficiently assigned the reason for the question proposed by your unconquered Majesty: because, if everything that concerns the piety of faith were plainly expressed in the Holy Scriptures, holy mother Church would not appear to have such great authority, and the merit of saving obedience would in large part be emptied out. At the same time I think enough has been answered to the main question, where certain people suppose that sacred Scripture is in many places confused and entangled; but if they read it with due purity of mind, they would certainly find it perfect and solid. 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, and if anyone, with rash daring, departs from its definition, he has denied the Gospel of Christ.
There is one congregation of the faithful, holy Church, the mother of Christians; outside its unity no one will be saved. And although in conduct it may sometimes seem weak, nevertheless, constant always in faith, it has never erred, the loving-kindness of Christ preserving it.
Concerning the reprobate and evildoers
Question Five
The fifth question of your most serene Highness was this: Why can impious, evil, and reprobate people in matters concerning faith, such as those women whom we commonly call witches, command malignant spirits, while good men and the most zealous observers of the Christian faith can command neither good spirits nor always malignant ones?
I remember that I answered this question before in this way. In all the works of the divine Majesty there is a sequence and order of beauty, an unchanging equity, by which each thing, suitably disposed, perseveres in the rank it has 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 all human beings, cannot be compelled by any violence of power not to remain in the order that the first human being received from the beginning of his creation. Hence no one among mortals is good except by the counsel of his own will, aided by the grace of the merciful God; and no one is evil except by his own will, deprived of grace because of the obstacle of sin.
By rectitude of will we are made like the good spirits, if we prove by holy and necessary works the piety of faith that we have in Christ. And just as the perfection of a good will makes good people equal to angelic spirits, so the perversity of the impious makes them like demons. Hence evil and perverse people, the more they have been depraved by the malice of their own will, become so much the more like demons in affection. Through likeness, moreover, friendship and familiarity are introduced, from which little by little mutual confidence is generated. From the lesser’s trust in the greater arises authority, whether it be true or simulated by cunning. Therefore, if there seems to be any authority of wicked people over demons, it arises from the greatness of depravity, namely when their affection is so far depraved, and by their reprobate will they either surpass or equal the malice of the demons that join with them. For demons are not all in malice [unclear].
FIFTH QUESTION
They are not equal in wickedness or intelligence; rather, one is much craftier than another in quickness of understanding, and far worse in corrupt disposition. For those who, having fallen from their high seats, are more closely joined to the earth and inhabit caverns and caves are certainly duller than the rest, to such a degree that they even fear swords and rods, and seem to be moved by the threats of men who terrify them, as may be seen in those whom we call the possessed. But demons who dwell farther from the earth are subtler by nature and encounter human beings more rarely.
Men full of wickedness, however, the more they advance in perversity of will, become so much the more like demons; and, once admitted by them into familiarity, they thereafter grow bold, and acquire a simulated, not truly coercive, authority over demons, which they use by that familiarity. For demons, in order to keep in their own depravity those men whom they have once received into surrender as willing subjects, gladly submit themselves to them, pretending to be moved by their entreaties; and what they do of their own accord they pretend to do as though compelled to obedience.
Indeed no one obtains true authority over demons unless faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, through the merit of holiness, has made him 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.” Therefore evil men command demons because malevolence has made them like them, likeness has made them familiar, and familiarity has made them their own and subject to them.
It is like the case of a great prince, as often happens, if one of his servants, born in a humble station and joined to him by long familiarity, is said to command him, because from him he obtains without contradiction everything he has asked, so that he seems rather to rule his master than to be ruled by him. According to this likeness, evil and reprobate men, who are admitted by demons into close familiarity and become very bold through prolonged confidence, receive over them a simulated, not to say familiar, authority, which they have deserved through the likeness of a most depraved will.
Hence whatever they request from demons, who cooperate with them by an implicit or explicit pact, they receive, unless at times the demons, prevented by divine ordinance, are unable to provide what is asked. Yet demons do not thus cooperate indiscriminately with all reprobate and evil men, but only with those with whom they have entered into alliances through the intervention of some pact: such as witch-women, who have offered homage to the devil, and those invokers of demons whom the common people call by the usual name necromancers.
There are two kinds of men who can lawfully command demons. The first is that of those men who, beloved by God through the merit of holiness, have received from him the power of treading down the head of the ancient serpent, such as in the primitive Church were the apostles and their followers and disciples, of whom the Lord speaks in the holy Gospel: “In my name they shall cast out demons,” and “they shall take up serpents.”
The second kind is that of those men to whom, by reason of order in the Church of God, it is granted to drive demons from the bodies of men by the power of the ministry they have received. And this ministry is committed to exorcists in the Church of God when they are ordained by the bishop.
Again, there are two kinds of men who desire to command demons; and the wicked conditions they accept show how unlawfully they presume to do so. The first and most pernicious kind is that of witches, who enter into pacts with demons and, after making a solemn profession, hand themselves over to some demon as his property and for perpetual service. What great evils this most pernicious kind of human beings commits in your dominion, no one
There is, most wise Caesar, no one who can express it. For, first of all, denying God, the faith of Christ, and holy baptism, they offer themselves in mind and body to demons; by their evil arts they weaken, injure, and kill men and beasts. There is no disease which, if God permits it, they cannot bring on, because, when they present themselves as servants to demons in observance of the covenant contracted with them, in comparison with those spirits they dare whatever they wish.
Therefore they are not to be tolerated at all, but rather are to be utterly exterminated in every place, as God, the creator of all, commands: “You shall not suffer sorcerers to live.” Some witches call upon demons with spells; others entice them with prayers and sacrifices; the rest, provoking them with unspeakable things and ceremonies, draw them into the service of their impiety.
It is therefore not surprising that witches seem to command demons, since through the impiety of a perverse will they have become their servants, and by mutual association are united for the harm of the human race.
The second kind of wicked men who wish to command demons is that of those commonly called necromancers, who profess arts full of abominations, 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 lies and superstitions, commit such evils that no good man could imagine them. For in order to entice demons into their service, they commonly use the foulest sacrifices and enter into an explicit pact with them.
They circulate many various little books full of filth, impiety, and falsehood, deceitfully inscribed with the names of ancient philosophers and sages; by displaying these they deceive many unwary and curious people and drag them with themselves into the pit of demons. They promise great things, indeed things wholly incredible, and by hearing of them they deceitfully hold men suspended in amazement. They say that by rings, pentacles, images, exorcisms, and conjurations they can compel malignant demons to appear visibly in a circle, or in a crystal, or in some other receptacle, and to answer distinctly all questions put to them.
All of them indeed promise this, but in our times very few are found whom malignant spirits, even evil ones, obey in this way, since God, for a most just reason, does not permit it, lest human curiosity, prone to novelties, should despise the religion of Christ and in time of need seek [unclear] assistance from demons. Yet all those whom malignant spirits obey when summoned by the conjurations of necromancers have without doubt passed into their fellowship through an explicit or implicit pact. But the number of the others is greater, whom malignant spirits disdain to obey, although they are not afraid to busy themselves at all times with the profane arts of necromancers.
And because iniquity has begun to abound especially in our times, and the charity of many has grown cold, these accursed and most lying men have become too powerful; and although they are despised by demons, nevertheless, persisting in their pernicious doctrines, they deceive many. Believe me, Caesar, this most deceitful class of men is very harmful to your holy empire, and therefore, no less than the brood of witches, must be utterly exterminated.
They promise great things, and they lie in everything. For in truth all the things promised in their books are empty and false, and they offer those who believe them nothing except tricks, frauds, and the most subtle deceptions. But if at times they seem to present what they have promised, it should be clear to all that this happens only by the cooperation of demons, from whose fellowship one must flee no less than from the most savage [unclear].
QUESTION FIVE.
with the torments of hell. For demons very often appear in these necromantic operations, and, so that they may keep their invokers stubborn in the treachery they have begun, they grant them what is asked, if they can. Sometimes, however, when invoked by conjurations, they disdain to appear, and nevertheless they have led away the minds of those who invoke them.
There is also another kind of people, no less foolish than superstitious: namely those who wish to have no commerce with demons, and nevertheless use, in vain operations, things assigned to demons and therefore wholly unlawful. For they think that great and hidden power resides in characters, and for that reason they commit various errors against the faith of Christ. But since this is not the time to recount their madness, let us pursue our subject.
Why good and just men do not obtain command over demons must be briefly learned. Just as likeness of wills makes wicked and impious men equal to demons, so unlikeness of wills makes the good and just entirely opposed to them. But among opposites and things unlike there can be no familiarity; rather, continual resistance and hatred prevail. Where there is no familiarity contracted by likeness of wills, there can be neither confidence of one toward the other, nor mutual cooperation in a marvelous operation. Nor do you, glorious Caesar, a man, the great ruler and prince of men, admit as your familiar anyone wholly contrary and unlike to you in morals and constantly resisting your will.
Good and upright men, because they always resist the most depraved will of demons, can in no way pass into their fellowship, for they neither wish nor consent to be their familiars, but flee and detest their encounter with all their strength. Therefore they do not obtain over them that fictitious command of which we have spoken. For no familiarity is secure where no likeness of wills has preceded it; nor can there be concord among opposites, nor friendship where the will is unlike.
Yet demons do not obey all the wicked and reprobate indiscriminately, but only those with whom they are allied by pacts and services, and whom they cannot otherwise have faithful to them; when invoked, they willingly come, though they falsely claim that they are compelled. Therefore it is not to be wondered at, most excellent Caesar, that malignant spirits sometimes seem to obey depraved and perverse men, whom, as we say, malice has made like them and destruction against the human race has made harmonious with them.
But far be it from every Christian to wish to command demons by a depraved likeness of will, since if anyone begins in this life to have fellowship with malignant spirits, in the future he will burn with them without end.
But why can good and just men not command the holy angels of God, into whose likeness of good will they have passed? I think that, from what has already been said, the solution to this question would easily be given, if the difference of understandings is recalled to mind. For although there are many men established in the Church of God whose righteousness benefits many unto salvation, nevertheless in our times very few of the common sort advance so far that, by the merit of holiness, they are either feared by demons or received by angels into the fellowship of familiarity. Hence it happens that men of our age neither command malignant spirits by merit of holiness, nor deserve to be familiar with the holy angels. But if any have advanced to that degree of holiness by which, performing miracles in the Church, the saints once advanced, then they are already able powerfully both to command demons and to have familiar fellowship with the blessed spirits.
For it is certain that holy men beloved by God in the primitive Church of Christians once bestowed greater benefits upon mortals by the cooperation of good spirits than the impiety of depraved men could ever have inflicted harms by the ministry of demons. For whoever has become a true worshiper of God, like the holy angels, can do many wondrous things by prayers.
On the Power of Witches.
QUESTION SIX.
The sixth question of your unconquered Majesty was: Whence comes this power so great in acts of witchcraft, by which they can accomplish so many various and wondrous things, even in one hour such and so great things as none of the good could do 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.
QUESTION SIX.
For he says in the holy Gospel of Christ: “Without me you can do nothing.” Hence it is clear that every power of doing anything is granted to human beings by the Lord God, and from nowhere else, whether people do good or evil. Thus the most holy Father Augustine says: “The will of God is the first and highest cause of all bodily forms and motions; and nothing happens visibly in this whole vast and immense commonwealth of creation unless it is 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 by which, through the cooperation of demons, they produce wondrous and dreadful effects is granted by the Lord God, whose will no one can resist and without whose influence a person cannot even move his hand. For the holy doctors conclude that neither demons nor witches can do anything, whether harming a human being or an animal, unless almighty God wills it, consents to it, and grants the power, so that they may do what he has decreed by his will [unclear]. Unless God consents and wills, no creature has any power; otherwise, if something could be done when he did not will or consent, it would necessarily follow that God was weak, since he could not prevent what he would be forced unwillingly to permit. But since every human being, insofar as he is a creature, depends on God, he can do nothing without the will of him from whom he has both the will and the power.
Whatever witches do, therefore, is done by God’s permission; without his will they can do nothing. And unless God had granted that they could do what they wish, they could obtain it neither from themselves nor from demons. Thus all power is from the Lord God, in whom all things exist and 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 can.
But since the understanding of witches is very 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 marvels. For the causes of the wondrous effects of witches are not such means as they use for witchcraft, such as owls’ heads, toads, serpents, characters, images, and things like these, but the devil who instituted these signs; for since he is most proud, he desires in all things to be seen as comparable to God.
Indeed, just as almighty God instituted certain sacraments in his Church, which, when worthily administered, signify and produce a saving effect through his own assistance, he who instituted them working salvation, so also the devil, who desires nothing more than to be considered equal to God, instituted certain signs as sacraments. When he is invoked by these by those with whom he has been joined in covenants, the malignant worker assists them, and as often as God permits, he brings about the evil that is requested; if God does not permit it, he does absolutely nothing.
For the devil is the worker of all the effects of all necromancers and witches: by applying the means which he himself first instituted to the subject matter, he produces the desired work, sometimes in reality, sometimes only in appearance. But witch-women, who have now passed over with depraved will and consent into the fellowship of demons through pacts, receive from them certain marks and symbolic signs, by which the demons, once summoned, immediately appear. In these destructive operations of demons nothing is stronger than the foolish credulity of little witches, which is increased by pacts and vows; for the firmer the faith they have placed either in demons or in their signs, the more swiftly they obtain [unclear].
with these cooperating in the operation. For the exceedingly savage corruption of the witches’ will in a certain way turns them into frenzy; when this has seized their mind, demons at once attach themselves to the raging women, and, summoned by pacts and signs, by God’s permission accomplish for the madwomen the effect of destruction.
Plato relates something similar in his book on poetic frenzy, saying: just as Bacchic women, when their mind is not sound, draw honey and milk from rivers, but when their mind is sound cannot draw them. This is brought about by their spirit, carried outside itself into fellowship with an evil demon. We know by experience that witches have drawn butter from rushing rivers at certain times, which cannot in any way happen otherwise than by the ministry of a demon.
In like manner, when they have been led into hatred of some man or beast, sighing for its destruction, they are driven by a most grievous frenzy, thinking of nothing in their mind except revenge. They take things known and familiar to them for witchcraft, invoke demons, show the signs appointed by them, and also the characters; and what they cannot accomplish by their own power, they obtain by the demons’ ministry.
But another person, who is not subject to the demons by pact and surrender, even if he knows the things suited to witchcraft and also the manner of operating, and although he displays the signs, nevertheless rarely obtains the effect, because he is not counted among the demons’ familiars. For the devil, swollen with pride, imitates the Church of Christ to such a degree that, just as an unordained man cannot consecrate the body of Christ, however much he may utter the words of consecration, so also a demon either never or rarely comes to the aid of one who invokes him and shows signs or characters, if he does not know that person to be subject to him by pact.
For if he came indiscriminately to all who invoked him without pacts having been made, he would not possess so many witches dedicated to him by right of ownership. Hence many who are given over to profane arts, striving by dreadful conjurations to call demons to a circle, a mirror, or any other receptacles, obtain no effect, because either God’s command stands in the way, or the devil despises the curious man who has not been dedicated to him by homage.
For three things are required for witchcraft, without which it is agreed that none is perpetrated: fury in the mind and a depraved will in the witch, the cooperation of a familiar demon, and before all else divine permission. If one of these does not concur, witchcraft cannot be perpetrated. For if God did not permit it, neither the devil nor the witch could do anything. And if the devil did not meet the will of the wicked woman, she would perpetrate no witchcraft. Again, if the witch is lacking, the devil will by no means bring the witchcraft to completion.
For the devil 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 keenness of subtlety, so the power of a witch is not one and the same in all, but differs in each according as demons of a subtler or grosser nature concur with them. For there are many kinds of demons, and they stand apart from one another by fixed degrees, according to the places into which they were cast down when they fell in the beginning.
The first kind of demons is called fiery; it ranges about the upper air and will never be plunged down to the lower regions before the day of judgment, but, remaining continually beneath the lunar regions, has no [unclear].
That they remain beneath the moon, however, Saint Augustine bears witness in his work On the Christian Struggle, saying thus: “Demons do not dwell in heaven, where the sun and the stars are, but all move about beneath the lunar region.” Moved by this, as I think, Apuleius said that demons are fiery animals; and for this reason Aristotle confirmed that in burning furnaces certain small animals have often been seen flying about, fitted with little wings, which spend their whole lifetime in fire, since they arise with the fire and are extinguished with it, and return, unknowing, to the place from which they had come. They have no fellowship with witches, since, dwelling in fire because of their subtlety, they cannot put on a gross body, nor even an aerial one.
The second kind is called aerial: it wanders in the air and dwells near us. Indeed, they can descend to lower places, and, taking bodies from the thicker air, sometimes appear visibly to human beings. When God permits, they often disturb the air, raise thunder and storms, and all conspire together for the destruction of the human race. They are moved by men’s greater passions, especially pride and envy; they are touched by continual disturbances, are not clothed with a solid body, and do not remain in one place. Nor do they all have one form, but many, and they change these quite often according to the variety of their affections, either when they come, summoned by the spells of witches, or when they are driven by disturbance to do harm. For they have an altogether violent and furious disposition, full of disturbances. Hence, being exceedingly wicked and disordered, they contrive many sudden ambushes; and while they make their assaults, some wish to lie hidden, others inflict violence. Witches, supported by the cooperation of these demons, are the more powerful for doing witchcraft, the higher in their order the demon they have obtained as an accomplice.
In the life of Saint Antony, the divine Athanasius said that the air is full of demons; and Hermes Trismegistus had said the same before him, namely that no part of the world is bereft of 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 related that demons flying in the air like very thick fiery snow become visible to those who desire it, if for some time, while the sun is shining, they keep their gaze fixed toward heaven with unblinking eyes. But I do not know whether the object in the air is caused by a real substance, or whether the checked motion of the eyes represents deceptive images; nevertheless, though not without some injury to the sense, yet a slight one, I have made trial of the things just mentioned.
The third kind is called that of terrestrial demons, whom we do not in the least doubt to have fallen from heaven to earth for their own deserts. Concerning these, that most holy bishop and martyr of Christ, Theophorus, once Ignatius, wrote thus in a certain letter to the Ephesians: “Nothing is better than to have peace, in which every weapon of the aerial and terrestrial spirits alike is made void.” Of these demons, some dwell in woods and groves, laying snares for hunters; others live in open fields, making travelers wander off course at night; some dwell in hidden places and caverns; the rest, less furious and disturbed than the others, delight in dwelling obscurely with human beings. They are not led by one affection, but by various ones, and some are less depraved than others, although all are full of evil disturbances. Some of these rejoice in frightening human beings with mere illusions; others desire to draw their hearers into admiration of themselves by predictions of future events. Some, however, strive with the greatest effort to terrify, injure, or kill human beings troubled by irrational frenzy or raging with melancholy; and we have learned by experience that this has often happened. Hence Saint John Chrysostom, in the third book On Providence to the monk Stagirius, says: “The greatness of grief is more powerful than every action of the devil in preventing harm; for whatever men a demon overcomes, he overcomes through grief. If you take that away, no one will be able to be harmed by a demon.” This kind of demon, however, is rarely familiar to witches, because of the inconstancy of their affections and the lightness by which they delight more in terrifying many people than in being subject to the command of one little woman. Yet sometimes, to flatter the insane, they dwell in glass or in crystal.
In a bowl, or in a mirror, and when stirred up by incantations, they give answers to women; and if someone who is about to come has cursed them on the road, they foretell it. This kind of witch sometimes differs greatly from the rest: for what the others make diseased by witchcraft, these promise to cure. But because they very often repel witchcraft by witchcraft, access to them is forbidden by the Church to every Christian.
The fourth kind of demons is called aquatic, because, plunging itself into watery places, it dwells around lakes and rivers. It is full of anger, troubled, restless, and deceitful; it raises storms at sea, sinks ships into the deep, and takes life from many in the waters. Whenever these demons assume a visible body, they appear more often in the female sex, and are more rarely seen in the male, because they remain in damp places and follow a softer manner of life, and cannot easily assume a male form in the manner of the others. Hence antiquity long ago named Naiads, Nereids, and nymphs of the waters not in the male sex but in the female. Among our people they are commonly called aquatic women, that is, wasser frauwen. But those who dwell in drier and somewhat arid places, whenever they appear bodily and visibly to human beings, transform themselves into men.
They also assume different forms of beasts, according as they are touched by various affections. But the holy angels, because they are not varied by 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 a male form. Demons, however, have very often been seen around rivers and springs in the shape of women, sometimes dancing, sometimes spreading out their hair after the manner of women, and sometimes speaking with human beings and carrying out various mockeries. And this kind of demon is not accustomed to have dealings with acts of witchcraft.
The fifth kind is called subterranean, because it dwells in caves and caverns and in the remote hollows of mountains. These demons are the worst in disposition, and they especially attack those who dig wells and mines and those who seek treasures hidden in the earth, being most ready for the destruction of the human race. They make openings in the earth, stir up flame-breathing winds, and shake the foundations of buildings. Sometimes by night they come out from the mountains in troops, lead wonderful and astonishing dances in the fields, and, as though fearing the command of one leader, suddenly vanish at a signal and return to their hiding places. At times the sound of our people is heard among them, and sometimes they falsely claim that they are the spirits of human beings who have departed this life. They seek nothing more than the fear and amazement of human beings.
Hence we have ascertained that they have sometimes led some of the simpler sort of men into their hiding places in the mountains, showing astonishing sights to those who marveled, and falsely claiming that the dwellings of the blessed are there and that they are friends of those who see them. Some of these demons also brood over the treasures which the greed of mortals has hidden in the earth; and lest they come again into human use, they carry them off, steal them, guard them, and sometimes transfer them from place to place. This kind of demon is not accustomed to have any dealings with women’s witchcraft.
The sixth kind of demons is called light-fleeing, because they especially dread and detest the light: for they never appear by day, nor can they assume a body in any other way than by night. This is the business that walks about in darkness, an inscrutable and utterly dark kind of demons, driven by cold passions, malicious, restless, and disturbed. It violently oppresses people who meet it in the hours of night, and more often, when God permits, kills some either by its breath or by its touch. This kind of demon does not associate with witches, nor can it be constrained by incantations, because it flees both light and the voices of human beings, and likewise every disturbance of the air.
The aerial kind is especially accustomed to come to the witchcraft of women, because it is subtler than all the rest and of the boldest rashness. Some of the terrestrial demons also, as has been said, serve acts of witchcraft; but since they are held to be of a lower rank, they cannot bring about those greater acts of witchcraft. It is therefore plainly established that the whole power of witches, by which they do such astonishing things, is granted to demons within limits set by the Lord God; and when he does not permit it, they accomplish nothing.
QUESTION SEVEN.
Why does he permit acts of sorcery to be done for the destruction of the human race, by which not only sinners but also many innocents perish and are grievously tormented? I remember that, when I was long ago placed before your Majesty, I answered this question in this way: Almighty God, just and upright, loving and merciful, whatever he permits, permits justly, because he is just, and there is no injustice with him; but all things that are done, he either does or permits in true judgment. Therefore, when it is asked why God permits evils to be done, let us answer: he permits them because he is just.
Let not the answer I 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, it would prejudice it if he did not permit evils to be done in the present world. For indeed, if he did not permit evils to be done, then man could not sin, and would certainly be incapable of sin; but that does not belong to his nature, to whom the Creator of all things gave free will from the beginning. For since man is a creature and not the Creator, he is necessarily capable of turning both to good and to evil, since his being depends on the supreme Maker of all creatures, just as every caused thing depends on the cause of its being. But to create has been left to God alone, who is incorruptible and everlasting; every corruptible thing, however, necessarily falls away, yet is preserved by the goodness of the Creator so long as it does not lose the influence of its cause.
Therefore it neither could nor should have happened that man, according to the condition of his nature, should be created incapable of sin; for that belongs naturally only to God, the Maker of all things, who is unchangeable and everlasting. But whenever it is granted to a man that he seems unable to sin, the freedom of the will is not taken away, nor is possibility simply removed, but the will is confirmed in the good. And whenever this gift is granted to a creature, it is a gift of grace, not of nature. For Scripture says: God created man from the beginning and left him in the hand of his own counsel.
For, properly speaking, it cannot be that mortal man, conceived in original displeasure, both has free will and cannot 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 be much more to be unable to sin. And so, if man could not sin, he would not have mastery over his own will. Therefore, although almighty God does not will sin, nevertheless he justly permits men to sin and to do evil, so that, while freedom of will remains, both the virtue of a good work may receive its reward and voluntary wickedness 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, since he granted them freedom of will from the beginning. Now many reasons have long since been assigned by the holy doctors why the Almighty permits such great acts of sorcery to be done through the cooperation of demons; of these we shall necessarily make brief mention in order.
The first is that the excellence of the divine power may be manifested, for he alone is unchangeable and far above every [unclear]. Every mutable creature has no comparison with the unchangeable Creator. Hence it is read in Numbers: God is not like a man, that he should lie, nor like a son of man, that he should change. In Isaiah also it is said: God is faithful, without iniquity, just and upright. In the book of Tobit too it is written: You are just, O 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. The work [unclear].
For a man’s work will repay him, and according to the ways of each he will restore to them. Therefore every person who rightly understands his own ignorance and weakness openly acknowledges that he is nothing in comparison with his creator. For God justly permits man to sin, both so that freedom of choice may be preserved, 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, by which he knows how to draw good from our evils, when he makes one person’s sin become another’s merit for an increase in virtue. For if he did not permit evil to be done, who among us would understand the good? For God makes and orders the good; but evils he does not make, though, once they have been done by the impious, he disposes them so that they do not come about without order. Nor does the malice of men hinder the will of God, nor can man do anything that God does not permit.
The third cause for which the Almighty permits evil deeds to be done is that he may manifest his most merciful goodness toward those who have sinned and done penance, which he could in no way show if he did not permit the creature to sin. For if there were no sinner, neither could God be one who shows mercy. But since in many things we all offend, everywhere God finds something to forgive; everywhere the guilty man presents himself, in whom the gracious Creator may show his mercy. Hence the holy prelate Augustine says: If the disease were slight, the physician would be despised, not 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, heaps together into one. Thus 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 upon those who have sinned and have not done penance; since if all acted well and no one sinned, God’s justice would have nothing to punish. Therefore, so that justice may have its place, the creature sins by divine permission. For the Lord is just, and he will repay each person according to the works of his will.
The fifth reason is the dignity of the human condition, because if God did not permit man to sin, he would seem worse off than brute animals, which, with no violence compelling them, freely follow the motions of nature. For although brute animals lack reason, nevertheless they freely have the motion of nature which they follow; in comparison with them man would seem to be of an inferior condition if he did not freely have free choice of the will. But God permitted man a will.
free will, over which neither kings nor princes have command. The sixth reason is praise for the merit of steadfast human virtue, when we praise a righteous poor man because, although he could have transgressed, with the help of God’s grace he remained steadfast in good will.
The seventh reason why almighty God permits demons to do such evils through witches is that those who, having despised truth, take delight in falsehood may be utterly deceived, seduced by the devil, the inventor of falsehood. For it is fitting that enchanters and witches, who disdain to follow the saving teachings of Christ, should be deceived by demons [unclear].
QUESTION SEVEN
It is manifest that the weak enemy of the human race, the devil, is in all things subject to the divine majesty. For the devil can do nothing by himself, but everything he does he does with God’s permission. Therefore the first cause of all, on account of which almighty God permits sorceries to be done, is justice: by it he preserves in inviolate order the freedom that he once bestowed upon the creature from the beginning.
But because the power of every creature dependent on its Creator is restricted and limited, it is manifest that neither the devil can do everything he wishes, nor can a man, however depraved in will. The will indeed is free, but power is limited by fixed and necessary degrees. For if demons could do everything they wish, nothing among human affairs would remain safe, but they would shake everything. The story of holy Job shows by manifest example that the power of demons is bound: Satan did not dare to tempt him any further than had been permitted to him by divine dispensation. For no one in this present world, however just or strong, could resist the fury of demons, if they could always use a free power to harm according to their own choice.
Before the Lord’s Passion they used a greater freedom of power than afterward; but when Christ tasted death for us on the altar of the cross, their power was thereafter greatly diminished, as the Savior says in the Gospel: “Now the prince of this world will be cast out.” Indeed, Christ’s humility and the perseverance of the saints have greatly restrained the boldness of demons, so that they can rightly be called inciters of evils, but by no means compellers. Nor would the devil grow strong 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 conclude the discussion for the understanding of the question proposed, namely why God permits so many sorceries to be done, I believe the reasons have been made sufficiently clear. For although the will of demons is always wicked, nevertheless their power can never be unjust, since what they wickedly will they have from their own choice, but what they are able wickedly to do they have only from God.
And these things have been said insofar as they concern those who do evil. But why does almighty God permit demons to harm, through the agency of witches, people 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 harm only the wicked, the perverse, and unbelievers in body and possessions, but were restrained from approaching and injuring the good and faithful, the judgment of this permission would rightly seem to be just. But now the good and innocent are more often weakened by the sorcery of demons, and sometimes are even deprived of life, to pass over in silence the loss of temporal possessions that those bewitched often suffer.
It comes as a scruple to many why the Almighty permits these things, since he permits nothing unjustly. For the purpose of this question proposed, I shall briefly set forth in order, as far as I can, the necessary reasons, which I have received from none other than the ancient and Catholic teachers.
The first reason is the testing of Christians’ faith and the proving of their integrity, so that those scourged by the sorcery of demons may show, in the sufferings of the flesh, what faith and love toward God they have in the hidden part of the mind. It is not difficult to be patient in prosperity, but in adversity to await with humble patience help from the Savior of the faithful belongs not to the weak, but to the strong and truly faithful Christians. In his tribulation most holy Job learned how great a constancy of faith he had toward God, which before in tranquility he had preserved without [unclear].
[unclear] piety with the dart of [unclear]. Hence it must also be noted that those whom the sorceries of demons or men have in any way made sick, and who, in order to recover health, approach or consult sorcerers and enchanters, whether by themselves or through others, act against the commandments of God and the Church, and have neither true faith in God nor love for him.
For they prefer the health of mortal flesh to God, and seek salvation not from Christ but from the devil and his minister. For they would rather live healthy but unhappily in the name of the devil than suffer a little here for love of Christ and afterward rejoice with him forever. But the man who does not go to sorcerers because God has forbidden it, preferring to live in observance of God’s commandments in poverty and sickness rather than against God in riches and bodily health, truly loves God and rightly keeps the integrity of the Christian faith.
Among Christians, most sacred Caesar, men corrupt in mind and reprobate concerning the faith are not to be tolerated: those who cure the bewitched by sorceries, who reveal thefts and adulteries through the ministry of demons, who foretell the future by inspecting stones or mirrors. Do not listen, I beg you, to those who, ignorant of the divine laws, think such ministers of demons useful for your rule because they know how to undo sorceries by sorcery; for that ruinous healing of bodies brings death upon souls, and makes men withdraw entirely from God their creator and cling 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 sorcery is the increase of merits: namely, so that their patience, tested in tribulation, may deserve a worthier crown of glory in heaven. For, as holy Augustine says, a man is unknown to himself; sometimes he fears that he cannot bear what he can bear, and yet, when temptation comes, a man is found by himself as though by a questioner, who previously lay hidden and did not know himself.
The blessed chief apostle Peter, before temptation came upon him, was hidden both from himself and from others, thinking himself firm and strong; but that temptation came, and his weakness appeared, which had been hidden. Therefore temptation is the greatest testing of man, as Sacred Scripture testifies: “The furnace tests the potter’s vessels, and the temptation of tribulation tests righteous men.” Patience is easy in prosperity, when no adversities strike with fear. But many are the tribulations of the righteous; 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 righteous man may always fear God and never presume upon his own strength or righteousness. Hence Scripture says of the reprobate: “They are not in the labor of men, and with men they shall not be scourged. Therefore pride has held them; they are covered with iniquity; out of their wickedness their iniquity has come forth, as it were from fatness.” It belongs to the mercy of God that he sometimes permits good and righteous men to be shaken by adversities, for he knows that in prosperity they cannot be humbled. For tribulation has made many humble whom good fortune would have made proud. Finally, the fearful imagining of sorcerers makes a good man fear his God and diligently call upon his help, so that, better defended by it, he may trust himself safe against the assaults of demons. But let no proud man, presuming on his own powers, think himself safe from the sorceries of demons; for the man whom God’s protection abandons because he is swollen with pride undoubtedly lies open to the sorceries of demons.
The fourth reason is so that there may be a distinction between the good and the bad. For Scripture says of good men beloved by God, in the Acts of the Apostles: “Through many tribulations we must enter into the kingdom of God.” And Saint...
Question Seven.
The holy lover of Christ, Paul, says in a certain epistle: All who wish to live piously in Christ will suffer persecution. Likewise the most wise king Solomon says in Proverbs: Whom the Lord loves he corrects, and he takes pleasure in him as a father in a son. Is it not a very glorious Christian thing, for the love of God, patiently to endure adversities, whether they are brought upon us by wicked men or by demons? For power is granted to the devil and his ministers to harm good and just people, not for their ruin, as their persecutors suppose, but rather for the greatest and sure consolation of the soul.
For truly, when a just man lives well, harms no one, offends no one, does injury to no one, loves, fears, and venerates his God with his whole heart, keeping his commandments with all care, and nevertheless is afflicted by sorceries, whether in body, or in possessions, or in both, that man is truly blessed, because 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 faith of the Catholic Church of Christians, and who for the love of God patiently endures the evils he receives in this world, has a sure sign that he will persevere in the grace of God and be saved.
On the contrary, concerning the wicked and the reprobate we read written thus: Why do the impious live, raised up and strengthened with riches? Their houses are secure and at peace, and the rod of God is not upon them. They spend their days in good things, and in a moment they descend to hell. For it is a manifest sign of damnation if here you live badly in sins and vices, contrary to God, and prosper in the goods of fortune, bodily strength, and health.
The fifth reason why the Almighty permits good and just people to be afflicted by the wicked and reprobate is for the complete purification of the mind. 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 ordains temporal punishments for just people, through mercy, for their offenses, but eternal punishments for the impious and reprobate, through justice. Therefore, out of mercy, he commutes eternal punishment for the penitent into temporal punishment, which they must necessarily suffer either in this world or after death in purgatory. But because the torments of purgatory are dreadful and very grave, the merciful God has been accustomed to purify in this life, in various ways, the penitents whom he loves, through the hardships of diverse tribulation in body and possessions. For the sorceries of the impious profit good and just people as a remedy, but those who inflict them they profit toward damnation.
The sixth reason is that a man, harmed by the attacks of demons, may be recalled to repentance and may set in his heart the necessary amendment of life. For almighty God does not send vengeance immediately when we sin, but waits until the appointed time for our amendment. But if we neglect to do penance, the avenger of evils comes to us when we do not expect it; and he whom we have scorned to acknowledge by repentance while we sinners were in tranquility, we shall acknowledge in tribulation by his severity. Hence the holy prophet speaks in the person of God, saying: If his sons forsake my law, and do not walk in my judgments, and do not keep my commandments, I will visit their iniquities with a rod, and their sins with scourges. But my mercy I will not take away from them, nor will I harm my truth.
The seventh reason why almighty God permits the demonic sorceries to prevail against good and innocent people is that he may cut off from them too unrestrained an occasion of sinning. For there are many poor and infirm people, pleasing to God, good, devout, and humble, whom poverty and sickness of body preserve in the love of God, who [unclear].
If they were rich and exalted with honors, they would quickly flow down from the purpose of holiness into the depth of vices. It is not expedient for everyone’s salvation to have honors and riches together with health; nor does a longer life always make a person better. Therefore almighty God, wishing to show his mercy in those whom he has chosen, permits good, just, and innocent people to be subject to various calamities. And sometimes through demons, sometimes through wicked people, and sometimes by various other ways and means, he turns away riches and honors from such people, which he foreknew they would use badly, so that they may preserve humility in poverty and abasement, which, if placed in wealth and high rank, they would by no means have kept. He also very often permits them to fall into many and great illnesses, because glad health of the flesh would have brought the greatest sickness upon the mind. Finally, he permits some to be driven to death by witchcraft, so that the freedom to sin may be cut off from them, which, had they been allowed to live longer, they would have abused. Hence Scripture says of the just man: “He was taken away, lest malice should change his understanding, and lest deceit should beguile his soul.” The eighth reason for divine permission is that people may venerate the sacraments of the Church, which have great power against all the witchcrafts of malignant spirits. For one who venerates the sacraments and rites of the Catholic Church with due honor is rarely harmed by the witchcrafts of demons. And by the very confession of witches we have often heard that the hearing of Masses and the use of things blessed by the Church greatly weaken the powers of demons. For things are not blessed in the Church of God in vain, but so that they may be defenses of divine protection and may show demons signs to be feared. But concerning boys and infants who, reborn in Christ, are in some way killed by the witchcrafts of demons or of human beings, we do not doubt that divine prudence 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 through witchcraft because of the sins of their parents.
On the Providence of God.
Question Eight.
This was the eighth question of your Serenity: whether it can be proved by natural reason, as also by the holy Scriptures, that God has care for human affairs and actions, and a certain and infallible providence over all and each of the things that he does in the world. I remember answering this question 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 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 prove this opinion briefly, first by the Scriptures and then, as far as is permitted, by reasons. In the book of Judith we read: “All your ways are peaceful, and you have placed all judgments in your providence.” And in Ecclesiastes the most wise king Solomon speaks thus: “Do not give your mouth to make your soul sin, nor say before the angel, ‘There is no providence,’ lest the Lord, angered against your words, destroy all the works of your hands.” The clearest testimonies of providence are confirmed in the holy Gospel, when our Savior says to his disciples: “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them falls upon the earth before God.” This is a great commendation of divine providence: it has care not only for human beings, but also for tiny birds. Indeed, if the Almighty cares for such small things, who would deny that he has care for great things?
Look at the birds of heaven, he says: they do not 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 is today and tomorrow is cast into the oven, how much more you, of little faith?
Almighty God, because he created all things and, when they did not exist, brought them into being, rules and governs the whole universe lest they slip and fall away. This could in no way happen if he did not have providence and care for all things. For if providence is taken away, the continuing order of the whole universe must necessarily be thrown into confusion.
But the Creator’s providence cares for all things, since he who feeds the birds, gives beasts their food, fills every living creature with blessing, and clothes the grass of the field, adorning violets and lilies with beautiful grace, cannot forget man, whom from the beginning he created in his own image. He cares for all things, who governs all things; and he bears providence not only for man, but also for all beasts, in whose dominion all things are placed, and there is no one who can resist his will in anything.
Let us therefore now consider this vast structure of the whole universe, how in its original disposition and motion it always persists in most perfect order; and, unless we shamefully depart from reason, we shall understand by the clearest reasoning that that divine and unchangeable providence preserves, directs, and governs it. Then let us contemplate all things of the earth, how most orderly each and every thing is born and proceeds 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, let us contemplate the earth, placed in the middle of the world as its point or center, which unfolds the circle of the whole universe at an equal distance, than which nothing more beautiful, nothing more adorned, nothing finally more delightful could offer itself to the senses for contemplation. In this point of an immense mass, enclosed by that very mass, we see all things wonderfully ordered, and nothing can be left unordered; so that all things which sometimes seem to us in some way to drift, we may know for certain do not lack their own order within the order of the universe. For by the simple and wholly unchangeable nod of God, the whole structure of the entire universe, gathered from so many diverse moving things, works together and is ruled in the most orderly way.
Certainly we see in those things that present themselves to our senses that the greater the intelligence and power that arise over time in any governor, the less can anything disordered happen there by fortuitous chance. Therefore, since that highest intellect, the creator, preserver, and ruler of all things, almighty God, rules and governs the world by his unchangeable providence, holding all things under his command, surely no place is ever left for rash chance, which would obstruct the will of so great a majesty.
Thus the whole universe, whatever exists anywhere or can exist, is contained under the command of the one divine mind, whose infallible judgment nothing can escape. But unexpected events befall us because we are changeable and are almost daily changed, having no determined knowledge of future things. Yet that best maker of all things, God, since he is wholly unchangeable, knows all things, beholds all things, understands all things together and at once. His providence is not deceived, his will is never varied, his power is not broken, his ordering is not violated, his counsel is never intercepted, even if at times his decision seems to be changed.
Therefore, if we diligently attend to these things, we shall plainly understand, as the ends of things and of motions will declare, that these lower things are made, preserved, disposed, and moved by divine providence, to whose command absolutely nothing is foreign.
God, the maker of the universe, both understands all things and, distinguished in a singular manner, is not divided into many things, but remains in himself one indivisible being; by beholding him as the pattern of the whole universe and the cause of cause through causes, he contemplates the cause of all things, and by contemplating all things he cares for them and provides for them, directing each one to a good end by an everlasting order. Come now, most wise Caesar: in order that we may understand the divine providence that governs all things, let us use arguments, as briefly as we can, for our purpose.
Thus, if God’s action is his own proper intelligence, as no wise man fails to admit, since it is at once most eminent and most inward, then insofar as he acts, so far he surely understands, and conversely. But he acts in individual things, not only in great things but also in the very smallest; therefore he understands individual things. For the influence of the first being extends most widely through each thing that in any way exists, following in fixed orders; and the things that act after him are moved and act everywhere by his power. Either, then, God understands or does nothing outside himself, which is false; or, by acting on all things and on each thing, he also understands them, which is true. For they would nowhere come to be unless first, to speak in our manner, they were understood by God himself, who makes them, just as they are not made by the sun and yet not perceived 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, so that things not only have from him 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 this they receive the proper office of a cause, that is, to preserve and care for, according to their powers, what they have made.
Therefore, if all causes have this property from the first cause, insofar as they are certain causes, then rightly does that first cause itself have this goodness and natural providence: to care for all things and each thing that it has made, inasmuch as it is supremely the cause of them all and of each one. Indeed, unless he who makes them guards them one by one, the common things that are preserved in individual things are never preserved. Nor will he preserve the whole, which consists of parts, if the parts themselves are neglected. Therefore from the intention of the first and greatest common intelligence comes the universal distinction of things; but it itself is distinguished from others by itself, and distinguishes all other things among themselves by the rule of its own knowledge. Hence, just as God knows all things and each thing most distinctly, so also he most distinctly rules, governs, and cares for them.
I think, therefore, most merciful Emperor Maximilian, that it is clear and sufficiently shown that the providence of God, the highest ruler, embraces, disposes, rules, and governs all lower things and each of them; for otherwise, without the provident disposition of one who observes them, they could in no way maintain this most beautiful order that we see. Nor am I unaware how variously the wise men of this world once held opinions about providence. Some of them thought that this world was made not by providence but by a cause; and if their opinion were true, no place would be left for providence, but all things would necessarily drift, since the world could perish by the same cause by which it was made. Against their false opinion others taught that the world could neither have been made without reason, nor certainly continue to exist unless it were ruled by the highest providence of its maker. Hence Boethius, a most Christian man, said: “O you who govern the world by everlasting reason, creator of earth and heaven, who command time to proceed from eternity, and, remaining stable, grant that all things be moved.” And again he said: “The generation of all things, the whole progress of changeable natures, and whatever is moved in any way, draw their causes, order, and forms from the stability of the divine mind.” Others, however, thought that God cares only for incorruptible things, such as the heavenly things and the separated substance, and at the same time the species [unclear].
Question Eight.
[unclear] governs, but that he truly knows nothing at all of all the rest and utterly neglects them. But these men shamefully erred, because the Almighty has providence and care not only of all things and of incorruptible things, but also of particular and corruptible things. Hence Saint Boethius again says: “The high Creator sits upon the earth and bends the reins that govern things, king and lord, source and origin, law and wise arbiter of equity. This is [unclear] continuous love, and good things seek to be held by their end, which cannot otherwise endure unless, by love turned back again, the causes flow back to him who gave them.” But others, unable to bear that they should be neglected, exempted man from the number of corruptible things because of the pre-eminence of his intellect, saying that God has care and providence for man, but despises all the other earthly things. Against their false opinion I think enough has been said, and to bring forward many things is wholly superfluous. For Scripture says: “Men and beasts you will save, O Lord.” And in another place a certain wise man said: “The Lord made the small and the great, and he has equal care for all.” Therefore divine majesty’s providence orders, rules, disposes, and cares for all and each of the lower things, great and small, corruptible and incorruptible; its most powerful will produced all things from nothing, as sacred Scripture again bears witness: “But your providence, Father, governs all things from the beginning.”
Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Spanheim.
Let men blush, then, corrupt in mind, impious, and reprobate with regard to the Christian faith, who, puffed up with empty talkativeness, take away the providence of him who knows all things, and do not consider how great an injury they do to God. For what, to use the opinion of Firmianus, is so worthy and so proper to almighty God as providence? But if he provided for nothing, if he neglected lower things, if he did not care for mortal things, he has now lost all dignity. But, as holy Anselm attests, it is impossible for God to lose his honor; he, as the Peripatetic says, in eternal things there is no evil, nor corruption, nor sin. Therefore he who removes providence removes the whole substance of God; and what does he say except that God does not exist? But now let those who deny that God’s providence cares for lower things tell me: if God neglects lower things, let them consider what necessarily follows. If God knowingly neglects and despises us, there is henceforth no reason why we should either follow him with worship or venerate him with religion, since we obtain no benefit from him; indeed, rather, being neglected and despised, let us neglect him himself also. But if he despises and neglects us unknowingly, there is now utterly no reason that we should worship one who does not know us and for that reason cannot confer any good, or invoke him with prayers. For if God does not care for human things, whether knowingly or unknowingly, every cause of piety ceases, since there is no hope of salvation. What consideration of piety can there be among mortals, what hope for the salvation of souls, if God does not care for human things? 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 men, nor imposes punishments on deserters; nor can he help mortals, nor does he wish to, nor does he care at all, nor does he attend to what we do, and he hears neither the prayers nor the petitions of anyone. Why, then, do we offer him any worship? Why honor? Why prayers? Or why do we fear or dread so greatly a God who does not know us, who, since we are neglected and despised by him, can do us neither good nor evil? Therefore, once providence has been removed, neither holiness nor religion will subsist; and when these have been extinguished, the greatest disturbance of life and horrible confusion will follow. With piety toward God removed, what now will the commonwealth be except everlasting confusion? Public faith among men will necessarily perish, and the society of the human race, and all justice will vanish together and perish.
Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Spanheim.
they were going. What will have to be thought concerning the Christian faith, if God does not care for human affairs? What, finally, concerning the savior of all, our Lord Jesus Christ, except that he will reckon the whole thing an empty fable and a fiction, if there is no providence of God caring for mortal things? Therefore whatever good we do in this life, whatever evil we endure for the love of God, is wholly vain and useless to us, if he has no care at all for us. Let those now see and shudder who deny the providence of God, when they behold the most evil end of their opinion: the despair of all. Therefore let no one, clothed in the vain talk of secular philosophers, train himself to contempt of God; let no one take away the providence of the highest and immutable good; let no one corrupt the dignity of the creator of all things. For all who deny divine providence show themselves both unworthy of and ungrateful for the benefits of the most merciful savior. For it must be firmly believed and in no way doubted that this whole world, visible and invisible, and all things and each thing that are either in heaven or on earth and in the sea, are ruled and governed by divine providence, and that absolutely nothing in the whole universe is alien to his care. For both the crops and all the rest that the earth brings forth, and also storms and the varieties of time and changes of the sky,
The Eighth Question.
by which all things that the earth brings forth grow to their natural maturity, divine providence furnishes and provides for the human race, all things and each thing; not only great things, but also the very least, so much so that not even the very slightest leaf of a tree falls to the ground without the will of almighty God the Father, who created, rules, and cares for them. But if anyone thinks that this so great magnitude of the whole universe cannot be ruled and governed by the eternal God, who alone exists, he is greatly mistaken, and is proved not to know how great is the power of divine might. Indeed, he who was able to bring the whole world from nothing into being is also able most wisely to govern forever what he made. For he knows all things, understands all things, can do all things, who alone, omnipotent, created all things. Therefore we, believing the holy Gospel, should above all venerate divine providence, and lift up our minds, with whatever virtue we can, from these perishable things, and, brought back to our very selves, be united: so that we may faithfully understand the majesty of God present everywhere, which, since it is altogether uncircumscribable, holds all things, fills all things, embraces all things, surpasses all things, and sustains all things. But it does not sustain from one part and
Joh. Trithemius, Abbot of Spanheim.
surpass from another, nor fill from one part and encompass from another; rather, by encompassing it fills, and by filling it encompasses; by sustaining and by surpassing it sustains all things. He is nowhere by the mass of a body, and by his uncircumscribable substance he is lacking nowhere; he is not seen by the eyes of flesh, but he is seen through faith in purity of heart. O unfathomable power, O incomprehensible compassion, O ineffable wisdom, O uncircumscribable divinity: which is not bounded by parts as a body is, not distinguished by affections as a soul is, not subject to forms as all other things are which have been made by you, you who are in all things and above all things, ruling and governing the universe most wisely. Thus by these testimonies, most sacred Caesar Maximilian, it has been sufficiently proved, as I think, that this whole world is governed by the providence of God: he, since he is pure intellect, simple, uncreated, and eternal, knows all things, understands all things, recognizes all things, and because he is omnipotent by nature, he can do all things, for whom nothing is difficult, nothing impossible; who by his power created things so wonderful, established them in truth, perfected them by reason, sustains them by strength, illuminates them by goodness. To him be praise, to him honor, to him glory, who lives and reigns, glorious and exalted God, forever and ever. Amen.
Eighth Question.
The Author’s Declaration to Caesar.
These are the things, most unconquered Caesar Maximilian, which seemed to me necessary to say in response to the eight questions proposed by Your Majesty. For you wished also to have from me a judgment on these same matters in writing, forming an estimate of me beyond the truth, since in ability I am not to be compared with those whose opinion you heard before me. Let this make me worthy of pardon, if I have said anything less proper: that, set on a journey as a traveler by command of Your Highness, I dictated, as I could, at intervals, whatever occurred to me that should be answered.
But I say from my heart and openly declare that I wish to remain until death a sincere confessor of the Christian faith and in union with the sacrosanct Roman Church. Therefore, if anything either in this little work of mine or in others is held to have been said or written otherwise than she holds, thinks, believes, and teaches, as a true son of obedience I renounce it by the attestation of these presents, and I wish it simply to be and to be held forever revoked.
For this reason, most wise Caesar, I both humbly beg and urgently admonish Your Majesty that, before you cause my responses to come to the knowledge of those for whom they are destined, you cause them to be [approved?] by the judgment of many. For with the utmost care it must be ensured that nothing be proposed to those over whose salvation Your Serenity keeps watch except what is sound, tested, 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 Neometan, on the tenth day of the month of July, in the Christian year one thousand five hundred eight.
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Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Sponheim.
cause them to come to the knowledge of those for whom they are destined, you cause them to be [approved?] by the judgment of many. For with the utmost care it must be ensured that nothing be proposed to those over whose salvation Your Serenity keeps watch except what is sound, tested, 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—
Johannes Trithemius, Abbot of Sponheim.
cause them to come to the knowledge of those for whom they are destined, you cause them to be [approved?] by the judgment of many. For with the utmost care it must be ensured that nothing be proposed to those over whose salvation Your Serenity keeps watch except what is sound, tested, 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—