amphitheatre was almost in an
instant filled with demons a hundred times more numerous
than at the former conjuration ... I, by the direction of
the necromancer, again desired to be in the company of my
Angelica. The former thereupon turning to me said, "Know
that they have declared that in the space of a month you
shall be in her company." He then requested me to stand
resolutely by him, because the legion were now above a
thousand more in number than he had designed; and besides,
these were the most dangerous, so that after they had
answered my question it behoved him to be civil to them and
dismiss them quietly.' The infernal legions were more easily
evoked than dismissed. He proceeds--'Though I was as much
terrified as any of them, I did my utmost to conceal the
terror I felt; so that I greatly contributed to inspire the
rest with resolution. But the truth is,' ingenuously
confesses the amorous artist, 'I gave myself over for a dead
man, seeing the horrid fright the necromancer was
in.'--_Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini_, chap. xiii.,
Roscoe's transl.--The information was verified, and
Benvenuto enjoyed the society of his mistress at the time
foretold.

Alchymy, the science of the transformation of baser metals into
gold, a pursuit which engaged the anxious thought and wasted the
health, time, and fortunes of numbers of fanatical empirics, was
one of the most prized of the abstruse _occult_ arts. Monarchs,
princes, the great of all countries, eagerly vied among
themselves in encouraging with promises and sometimes with more
substantial incentives the zeal of their illusive search; and
Henry IV. of France could see no reason why, if the bread and
wine were transubstantiated so miraculously, a metal could not be
transformed as well.[111]

[111] The class of horoscopists (the old Chaldaic
_genethliacs_), or those who predicted the fortunes of
individuals by an examination of the planet which presided
at the natal hour, was as much in vogue as that of any other
of the masters of the occult arts; and La Fontaine, towards
the end of the seventeenth century, apostrophises the class:

'Charlatans, faiseurs d'horoscope!
Quittez les cours des princes de l'Europe;
Emmenez avec vous les souffleurs tout d'un temps;
Vous ne meritez pas plus de foi.'....

_Fables_, ii. 13.

But it is only necessary to recolle