Question I. What harmful magic is, and how many kinds there are
Harmful magic is defined and divided. Certain things that concur in all acts of harmful magic are set out.
The various efficient causes, or instruments, of harmful magic: powders; herbs, straws, and similar things that are placed beneath; ointments; breath or blowing; words, threats, rebuke, praise; sacred things, such as holy water; the open way; infanticides; the sucking of blood; the ancient opinion concerning striges. Gelo, the striges of Panama, and Lilith as mothers of demons, and the errors of the Hebrews concerning them. Lamia, what she is and of what sort among the Greeks. Lamentations 4; Isaiah 34. By what means infants were killed formerly and are killed today.
Question II. On the harmful magic of sleep
The solemn rite and examples. Passages of Virgil, Ovid, and Valerius Flaccus. Telephron. What Apuleius means by a cloud born of sleep. The sleep-inducing methods of magicians; various signs according to the instruments used, and examples of each. On ointment and unguents; whether they can be changed into tiny living things and enter narrow cracks.
Question III. On love magic
Section I
What it is; certain things of this kind believed by the ancients. The astirites stone; the lynx, and what kind of bird it is. On philters of our own age. On things done within the body, and how sacred things are very often mixed into them, with examples.
On things done outside the body. The sacrileges mixed into these. On erotic images. On virgin parchment made from the skin of a boy. Why sacred things are abused especially in this kind of harmful magic, and a certain example concerning the Eucharist.
Section II
By what argument it is proved at length that the force of love magic cannot compel the will, but only the appetite. The law Eorum, in the Code, On Malefactors and Mathematicians.
The passage Baruch 6:42 is treated carefully. What cords are in Jeremiah and what cords occur among the poets; passages of Virgil, Valerius, Nemesianus, and Propertius. What the Greek word ta pitera means; the Vulgate interpreter defended. A passage of Theocritus; a passage of Burchard. Olives customarily burned. The edible epityrum. A passage of Hesychius. What bones signify among the Hebrews; what olive stones mean.
How harmful these things are to mind and body is shown by reason and examples. On hippomanes, and how many kinds there are; various authors are explained. Various judgments against magicians of this kind, and what penalty belongs to Roman law. Anton Guibert is refuted. An example of divine vengeance that occurred in Misnia.
Section III
On remedies against love potions and the snare of love; certain vain remedies of the gentiles. Passages of Virgil, Tibullus, Nemesianus, and Propertius. The error of Pomponazzi. On natural antidotes; on moral and Christian antidotes. From Helinand, what things are accustomed to bring on love or foster love once born. Things to be avoided. Remedies in fact. Fine examples: Hypatia, Appa and Gela, and a certain priest. Cardano is refuted together with his remedy.
Question V. On hostile harmful magic
What it is; on its ingredients. A certain opinion of Grillandus is noted.
Section I. On fascination
This whole question is now more clearly set out. On common poetic fascination, what kind it is, and what superstitions arose from it.
The name of the phallus-charm; praefiscini; on the Spanish higa. Passages of Virgil and Tibullus. On spitting into the bosom. Whether someone is fascinated by well-wishers or by himself. Entelidas and Narcissus. Passages of Plutarch and Heliodorus. How boys are fascinated according to Plutarch. Fables are refuted.
The inconsiderateness of certain theologians. What philosophical fascination is, and why it is improperly called fascination.
The Pontic Thybies. A passage of Plutarch. The force of sight upon body and soul from Plutarch. The origin of love. Naphtha of the Medes. The bird hiaticula. A remedy for jaundice. The gaze of the envious; probaskania. In what way contagion is propagated through sight according to theologians. Richard’s statements are discussed: whether sight, by seeing, acts upon a mirror; whether contagion arises from the pupil or around it. Whether the beloved person has some physical quality that causes him to be loved. Ecclesiastes 9:9. The opinion of Abulensis is discussed. Whether the term fascination should be received by Christians. The definition and etymology of fascination. Passages of Deuteronomy 28:56 and Matthew 20.
Passages of Horace, also Ecclesiastes 31:25, Wisdom 4:12, and Galatians 3:1. Whether Sarah was a fascinator. The opinions of Jerome, Chrysostom, Anselm, Tertullian, and others concerning fascination. A vindication of the commentary assigned to Leonardo Hasselius. Magical fascination, what it is and of what sort.
On an old man of Viterbo against life. Who the Telchines are. The Palamnaeans. Families of fascinators in Africa, among the Triballi, and in Illyricum. Whether the signs of fascinated persons are in the eyes. What natural remedies can do against fascination. What fascination means when taken in its broadest sense. Whether the judges of fascination are true. Whence the common opinion of fascination arose.
Section II. On poisoning forms of harmful magic
What power the devil has over the wicked. Luther’s error. 2 Corinthians 4:4. Lambert Daneau is noted. Witches can kill and inflict diseases. The magician Elzan killed very many. How many the witches of Helvetia killed; indeed, they even devoured their own children. Harmful magic by acupuncture. On other cases in Upper Germany, among the Salassi, and among the Genevans.
Two methods by ingestion, with examples, and the bewitching of children; a third by inhalation. The death of Clement VII. An example of an Italian charlatan, another from Alsace, and another from the Black Forest. What is the cause of this inhaled poisoning. Bodin’s error. On an Italian poisoner active in Paris.
On poisons applied externally, and various methods. Passages on this matter from Horace and Lucan. Telephron, mutilated by lamiae in the form of a weasel. A passage of Apuleius and of Quintilian.
The monstrous foods of the Gnostics; hence the cause of slanders against Christians concerning infanticides. Certain poisons of wondrous effectiveness. On the Stygian water. Joubert’s opinion is noted. What scopelismus is. Who the saccularii are; the laws cum quaedam and sacculariorum in the Digest, On Extraordinary Crimes. Passages of Job 5:23, Virgil, and Plautus. Spanish terms: cargarel, dado.
Section III. On abortion, difficult childbirth, and the drying up of milk
Stadlin, by placing a lizard under the threshold, killed infants in the mother’s womb. Abortion procured by breath, as in the Littellan affair. The perpetual pregnancy of a certain woman in Apuleius. Alcmene’s difficult childbirth. An example and rite of stolen milk; this happened at Trier. On milk dried up, even in a woman, by threats alone. On the theft of grain by harmful magic.
Section IV. On archers, assassins, and harmful makers of images
The single canon On Archers is explained: what kind of people they are. Their rites and some examples, such as Punkler and others. On Finnish and Lappish archers. The single canon On Homicide, in book 6. Who are properly assassins.
On harmful image-makers. Cardano and Wier are noted. Althaea’s fatal brand for Meleager. Passages of Ovid and Horace. The history of Duffus, King of Scotland. On Enguerrand’s wife; on other more recent cases in France, that of Charles IX and that of a certain pontiff. On the statue fatal to Simon the Bulgarian. On another three-headed statue, and on other things that were magical in the Byzantine Ciceon.
Section V. On various diseases inflicted by a demon
Demons send various diseases. Pomponazzi and Lemnius are noted. Matthew 17:14. On lunatics and epileptics. A passage of Firmicus.
Examples: Thallus so affected in Apuleius; another example from the Malleus. Luke 8:27; Luke 13:11; 1 Kings 16:14-15, 23. Names of demons in Sacred Scripture taken from their effects. Why the authority of Sprenger and Nider is great in these matters.
Various examples brought by them. They bring on the madness of Blessed Angela of Foligno and of Stiradius. An example from Mattioli. Diseases of the gentiles caused by demons, such as those of the Ceriales, Panics, and Fanatics. By what means a demon inflicts diseases. Catechites.
Section VI. On the wondrous insertion and ejection of solid and large things into and from the body
The example of the woman of Zabern, and seven or eight others; especially a wondrous example from the life of Saint Peter of Tarentaise. The nun of Pisa.
What can be naturally born within the body? The example of a certain count. What things cannot be naturally born within it.
By what means a demon can insert and expel such things. Two examples from Ambroise Pare, concerning a student and a shepherd. A third from Remy. The method of Paracelsus concerning lightning and water is refuted.
Section VII. On the harmful magic of devoting someone
That there are some energumens, and what is required for this, so that they may be said to be possessed by a demon. Whether men have the power of devoting someone in this way. Whether devils enter the bodies themselves. The opinion of Blessed Hildegard is discussed. Various examples from Caesarius, Gennadius, and Tostatus. A passage of the writer of the Ecclesiastical Annals is noted, explaining why God sometimes permits this.
Section VIII. On the harmful magic of binding
On a certain opinion of the common people, and from it a nuptial custom: that men are accustomed to be rendered bewitched.
On the various modes of bindings. Why more men are bewitched than women. The immediate cause of the harmful magic. On Lemnian women bewitched; on Bohemian women; Valazca; a passage of Propertius; the story of the priest Palumbus and Venus.
On the offering of male organs, with a passage of Sprenger noted. On female constriction. On a relative impediment. That a certain impediment is perpetual, against certain canonists, and what kind it is. A certain wondrous permission of God among the Karenzini. On the spring of Salmacis.
Section IX
On the harmful magic of hatred: an example and a passage of Virgil. Another example, and by what means the demon procures this harmful magic. On the harmful magic of forgetfulness and an example of it.
Section X
On incendiary harmful magic. On Medea’s crown; a passage of Seneca; various examples in Lorraine, Helvetia, and the Rhenish province.
Question V. What persons sorcerers are able to harm
No one without God’s permission; once that has been granted, they can harm all men. Why infants are permitted to be harmed. Why they most often plot against them. Examples of infanticides. The common opinion concerning the acquisition of insensibility. On pagan ointment. Why they are sometimes permitted to harm even good persons.
The common opinion is discussed and interpreted: that they cannot harm ministers of justice. It is shown that the contrary has sometimes happened. A certain argument of Anania is rejected. Nider’s opinion is noted. Goninus, a Parisian magician. Whence the opinion arose.
Question VI. Why God permits sorcerers to abuse sacred things
Question VII. Why God permits the demon to rage so greatly through harmful magic
Section I
It is for the glory of God, because in this way God’s attributes are shown: sweetness, mercy, wisdom, power, justice, and so forth.
It is for the various benefits of human beings: first, of those who are harmed, in whom patience, constancy, charity, humility, and the remaining virtues are trained. Examples of a certain hermit and of Saint Julian. Then the faith of others is confirmed and various errors are rooted out. People are taught that demons exist. Heretics are taught that they do not have the true faith, since they cannot heal these things or put demons to flight. The example of Luther; also of a Lutheran parish priest, of ministers of Augsburg, and of Calvinist ministers in Picardy. Demons attended Luther’s funeral and the Belgian iconoclasm. Why Calvinists leave images of the demon untouched but break images of God and the saints. Various examples of this matter.
Section II
The vengeance of sins is the chief cause: sometimes of others’ sins, as in the disciple of Blessed Eleutherius and in the infant in Saint Gregory; also because of the unjust curse of parents, or even of spouses.
Such sins are obstinacy against God and other superiors or parents: Nebuchadnezzar, the Egyptians, two Florentine youths, the ten brothers, and the curses of parents. Proverbs 30:17. Hatred, desire for vengeance, and envy: the example of Saul, another from Alexander ab Alexandro, and four in the life of Saint Arnulf.
Carnal desire, even of spouses, and the things directed to this. Sarah’s husbands; the girl Magdalene in Saint Jerome; a girl in Saint Prosper. Why are so many things permitted to the demon against married people?
Sacrilegious violation of vows, and how horribly it is punished: the terrifying example of three monks. Unjust cruelty, as of King Boleslaus and Duke Geila; also false accusation or slanderous incrimination, as concerning three women and one man who slandered Saint Gregory of Sicily and Saint Daniel the Stylite.
Opposition to acknowledged truth and apostasy, with examples of various persons in Sacred Scripture, in the canons, and in Saint Cyprian.
Blasphemy: Alexander and Hymenaeus; the tailor of Worcester in Thomas Waldensis, blaspheming against the Most Holy Eucharist; Caianus, blasphemous against the Mother of God; and others at Constantinople and Nijmegen.
Cursing, by which someone conditionally devotes himself to the demon: a poor woman in Caesarius; also the man who sold his soul to the devil; the Cologne virgin in Nider concerning the monthly blessing omitted; Peter of Bern, a judge, and the omitted sign of the cross; the host of Spandau; the captain Bravo; a certain nobleman of Silesia; a Saxon virgin; a certain reviler of a martyr; and Count Godwin.
The vice of usury, concerning certain nuns. Why alms given to witches may be harmful. Hardness and lack of mercy toward the poor: on witches therefore begging, on a certain man of Poitiers, on the Archbishop of Mainz, and on a certain Kirchberger. Mockery of sacred mysteries, contempt for the rites and censures of the Church: on a Batavian imitating the Mass; on Novatus; on Proculus the Arian; on the Donatists; on those who receive the Eucharist unworthily, with three examples. The death of Epachius. Many perished because they despised the excommunication of a bishop.
The plundering of churches and sacred things, and the seizure of ecclesiastical revenues and rights: on the Count of Macon; on Otger the steward; on two others; also on the punishment of certain soldiers in Spain after this life, as they declared when they appeared. On Deoca, saved on account of alms; on Bernet, damned on account of corruption and injustice.
On Alfonso, King of Aragon, freed from the pains of purgatory by the prayers of the Cluniacs, against the heretics, and on confession.
Mockery and contempt of holy men and feast days: concerning a certain woman; the example of a woman punished because she had entered a men’s monastery and falsely assumed male dress; likewise those who despise the celebration of feast days. On the citizens of Torpes. Timidity, despair, curiosity: Theophilus the steward.
On venial faults: Moses because of a slight anger; a certain religious woman because of hasty gluttony; another because of tepidity and distraction in prayer.
Question VIII. Why, since the devil can usually inflict these harms by himself, he prefers to do so through others
Because this leads to greater contempt of God. He harms more people. He could not do certain things so conveniently by himself, for example spread heresies or abuse sacred things through sacrilege. So that God may permit him to do more things against human beings. On remedies, briefly.