m_ of theologians, philosophers, and
jurisconsults; whence he concludes "that its existence cannot be
denied, or even a doubt cast upon it, without sapping the foundations
of what is called human belief." But the little I have said in No. IV.
alone suffices to prove how false is this assertion concerning this
pretended general consent. Horace, who passes for one of the wisest
and most enlightened men amongst the ancients, reckons, on the
contrary, among the virtues necessary to an honest man, the not
putting faith in what is said concerning magic, and to laugh at it.
His friend, believing himself very virtuous because he was not
avaricious--"That is not sufficient," said he: "are you exempt from
every other vice and every other fault; not ambitious, not passionate,
fearless of death? Do you laugh at all that is told of dreams, magical
operations, miracles, sorcerers, ghosts, and Thessalian
wonders?"[675]--that is to say, in one word, of all kinds of magic.
What is the aim of Lucian, in his Dialogue entitled "Philopseudis,"
but to turn into ridicule the magic art? and also is it not what he
proposed to himself in the other, entitled "The Ass," whence Apuleius
derived his "Golden Ass?" It is easy to perceive that in all this
work, wherein he speaks so often, the power ascribed to magic of
making rivers return to their source, staying the course of the sun,
darkening the stars, and constraining the gods themselves to obey it,
he had no other intention than to laugh at it, which he certainly
would not have done if he had believed it able to produce, as they
pretend, effects beyond those of nature. It is, then, jokingly and
ironically that he says they see wonders worked "by the invincible
power of magic,"[676] and by the blind necessity which imposes upon
the gods themselves to be obedient to it. The poor man thinking he was
to be changed into a bird, had had the grief to see himself
metamorphosed into an ass, through the mistake of a woman who in a
hurry had mistaken the box, and giving him one ointment for another.
The most usual terms made use of by the ancients, in speaking of
magic, were "play" and "badinage," which plainly shows that they saw
nothing real in it. St. Cyprian, speaking of the mysteries of the
magicians, calls them "hurtful and juggling operations." "If by their
delusions and their jugglery," says Tertullian, "the charlatans seem
to perform many wonders." And in his treatise on the soul, he
exclaims, "Wh