I suppose that if that light of certainty, about which Section I spoke, has been joined to the revelation, then it matters little whether the vision happened to a person awake or sleeping. If this light is lacking, then more should always be given to a revelation made to one awake than to a dream-vision, as Varro calls it. This being supposed:
First, one must consider what kind of revelation it is: whether it is a wise vision, that is, one conformable to the wisdom which is from heaven. Such it will be, as Gerson testifies, if it has those things required by St. James: that it is chaste, modest, persuadable, agreeing with good things, full of mercy and good fruits, not judging, without simulation.
To explain this more fully: if it instigates one toward something that makes him more like the examples of Christ and the saints; if it makes a person intrinsically more humble than he would have been without the revelation; if it makes him gentler, milder, more recollected, and more withdrawn from secular and foreign cares; if it invites him toward simplicity, union, and, so to speak, intimacy of heart; if that to which it instigates is adorned with more virtues and better ones than its omission or the contrary deed; if that to which it invites is simply and inwardly good, not only from some one part; finally, if it stirs up the beginner to detestation of sin and confusion over his past life, advances the proficient through the inflammation of good desire and the devotion of fervor toward better gifts, and fills the perfect person with an inward foretaste of divine sweetness.
Hence John of Salisbury wrote splendidly in book 2, chapter 17:
But since these things are done around human beings by spirits, the faithful soul should not reject that image alone which leaves innocence unharmed. But if it brings material for vices, perhaps kindling lust, or introducing the appetite of greed or domination, or anything of this kind, for the subversion of the soul, without doubt either the flesh or the evil spirit sends it in.
He skillfully mentions two sources of false revelations: the flesh and the demon. But a little later he speaks less skillfully and less truly when he declares that all things said about witches are false, which was refuted by us elsewhere above in book 2.
Demonic revelations should be judged those which work the contrary to the things just named: those which incite toward scurrilous and carnal things, or toward envy, detraction, and immodesty; those which make a person turned away from imitation of Christ and the saints; those which make him rejoice in his new and singular inventions. For, as St. Bernard says very well, that malignant spirit sometimes transforms himself into an angel of light so that he may do more harm by emulation of virtue. But even then, if we look carefully, he never scatters anything except seeds of bitterness and discord. For he persuades some people to certain singular fasts, from which the rest are scandalized: not because he loves fasting, but because he delights in scandal.
Likewise, if it persuades anything contrary to the canons, constitutions, rules, or other commands of superiors. By this sign Blessed Simeon, a monk of Trier, detected the demon. The story is narrated by Everwin the abbot:
When Simeon had been sent by order of his superiors to the top of Mount Sinai to live there, in the night hours a demon appeared to him under an angelic appearance and urged him to celebrate Mass. He, neither entirely sleeping nor perfectly awake, resisted, saying that no one ought to fulfill this ministry without the order of priesthood. The enemy pressed on, saying that he was the legate of God, that Christ willed this, and that it was not fitting for so holy a place to be deprived longer of such a ministry. Therefore, with another demon joined to him as companion, they drew him, resisting and contradicting, from his bed, set him before the altar now awake, clothed him in an alb, and argued on both sides about the stole: the enemy, in the manner of a priest, and Simeon, in the manner of a deacon, contended that it ought to be placed on him. At last the servant of God, having returned to himself, repelled the enemy by the virtue of prayer and the sign of the cross, and groaned that he had been deceived.
[margin: Varro’s term for dream-vision; James 3:17; Gerson on wise vision; John of Salisbury, book 2, chapter 17; Bernard on the spirit transformed into an angel of light; Everwin on Blessed Simeon of Trier]
In like manner an illusion was detected from a similar, almost attempted audacity of pride, and because the revelation was not the author of modesty, at the beginning of the Premonstratensian order. I shall narrate the whole matter in the words of the writer contemporary with Blessed Norbert:
Among these religious men of Premontre, that deceitful spirit, considering certain men to be unlearned and recognizing that they had once been his vessels, in which he had been accustomed to indulge his quiet pleasure, so filled them with the false wisdom of his illusion that those who previously had barely known how to read in books now said certain great things from books, and by prophesying about future things predicted greater and astonishing things. One of them asserted that he knew the prophecy of Daniel, and spoke about it, as the leader of a lie, where the prophet writes and leads one in about the four, seven, and ten horns and kings, and about Antichrist. In these things he had already made the simpler people attentive, and, if it could be done, would have drawn even the man of God himself and the venerable abbot Simon of St. Nicholas into error.
For his arrogance had already progressed so far that, while they were sitting, he dared to make a sermon even in chapter. And the one who saw and heard gives testimony about this matter. This was his sign, that he brought forth the beginning of a sermon. For this was the sermon: “Be strong in battle and fight with the old serpent.” That lying spirit brought these things forth through that instrument; but he was by no means able to advance to the truth that follows, namely: “and you shall receive the eternal kingdom.”
But when that false spirit saw that he was detected in part by listeners of truth and sweetness, being, as he is, an artificer of a thousand arts, he turned himself with greater art to other kinds of deception. Since he could not subvert those intent on manifest work, he would at least turn contemplatives away from contemplation. For that same cleric, the minister of this work, was seized by a certain sudden and very grave illness; and he who before gave answers about visible things now did not fear to set his mouth in heaven to utter invisible and ineffable things. The brothers run together, as is customary, to anoint him. They run together to hear the things that he was saying. Concerning himself indeed he asserted great things, but concerning many who stood around, greater things. Concerning himself he said that on the same evening he would either be with the angels in heaven or would stand healthy with the other brothers in choir. But concerning others, considering the capacity of individuals, he spoke as if prophesying and divining: “This man, when I was recently rapt in church to the higher things, I saw called to eternity; this man already,” and so forth. He adds various things about others.
See here the degrees of pride. First the demon chooses the unlearned for himself and makes them seem learned. Then he makes them interpret Scripture. Third, he makes them discourse even before superiors in places where they should be silent about such things and should rather humbly acknowledge fault. He makes them false prophets, speaking great things about themselves and no lesser things about others, so that pride may rub off upon many.
He afterwards adds about another man doing the same thing, and says that all these contrivances of the demon were dispersed as soon as the religious men, sniffing out the fraud, answered that they wished to hold this man and hear no one else any further until their father Norbert returned. For this response, by the virtue of humble obedience, conquered the demon. And scarcely any more effective remedy exists.
[margin: Surius, June 6, chapter 27, on Blessed Norbert and the Premonstratensians, including the false prophecy on Daniel, the chapter sermon, and the obedience remedy]
I shall give another example from the words of Francis Bencius, from the annual letters of our province of Milan for the year 1590:
In a certain town, a suburb near Arona, around thirty women are agitated by an evil demon, almost all of them virgins of the lowest condition, especially those bound by a vow of virginity. It is marvelous by what deceits he surrounds these, by what arts he attacks them. He assumes various forms, so that he may entice them to unspeakable things and deter them from honorable ones. He imitates now the person and piety of a monk, and, what the ears shudder to hear, even of Christ crucified himself, urging them to impious things. He also appears as a bear, a lion, a serpent, making an attack on the girls with gaping mouth and as if about to devour them in one gulp; and as a threatening soldier with a musket ready and prepared, now about to shoot out a deadly ball with flame and thunder, unless he extorts consent. But the simplicity of the virgins, relying on God, conquers every craft. Their faith magnified the Lord’s name, and with the fiery shield they extinguished the most wicked darts.
Two narratives will be given from very many.
One of their number, born of noble parents and delicately educated, when she once had a night infested by the Devil lying in ambush, left her bed, and, although it was the middle of winter and the weather very cold, lay naked on the bare pavement. Since the flame nevertheless increased, as if a great fire had been fed by water, she secretly left the bedroom and withdrew into the garden. There, in great imitation of Francis, whom she had learned to have done this when he fell, she threw her body into a bank of snow, and for a long time, while the demon who was seen by her resisted and gnashed his teeth, she rolled about until she extinguished the internal fire by external cold.
Likewise, the demon showed himself by night to another in the image of Blessed Ursula, carrying the standard of the cross with the company of many virgins, and spoke thus: “God sees and loves that zeal of yours for protecting chastity. But because in your father’s house, amid so much noise of people coming and going and the presence of dangers, it is very difficult for the mind not to be contaminated in some part, he has sent us to lead you away into a monastery of sacred virgins, who, with all cares omitted, serve the divine majesty zealously.” Here the little virgin, with God breathing upon her and perceiving the Devil’s ambushes, drew her right hand from head to breast, and soon from left to right to form the cross, and professed that she was most unworthy of so great an honor. “Nor,” she said, “do I have great faith in you. I fear and suspect hidden deceits in beautiful counsels. But if you are performing God’s embassy, humbly venerate these relics of the saints.” She had relics tied around her neck. Wonderful to say, the masks fell to their knees as if reverencing them. They urged all the more that she hasten the journey. But she said: “It is not lawful for me to determine anything more serious without the order of my spiritual father, nor is it fitting to go to him in the dead of night. Go to him, explain God’s command, and when it grows light I shall come and use his counsel.” At this answer the demons, with every disguise thrown aside, hid themselves in their own darkness, snarling insults and reproaches against the girl, who laughed at them because they fought only with the tongue, and gave thanks suppliantly to God.
Thus far Bencius. What could be wiser than this virgin? Plainly true wisdom was teaching her, the wisdom to which she had bound herself by the belt of chastity. Impurity immediately betrays the demon. Thus St. Robert the abbot recognized the demon at a wedding from curled hair, insolent face, and curious wandering; and St. Dunstan recognized the same by lascivious form, movement, and words, and wittily mocked him, seizing his nose with red-hot tongs, as Osbert of Canterbury testifies.
[margin: Francis Bencius, annual letters of the Milan province, 1590, on the Arona women; St. Francis’s snow example; Blessed Ursula’s false apparition and relic test; St. Robert the abbot, with a Surius reference for June 7; St. Dunstan and Osbert of Canterbury, with Surius on May 19]
I shall add an example of singular caution, by which we are taught that nothing is safer than to fear one’s own judgment and not to depart from obedience to superiors through confidence in any revelation, even a certain one. Genebald, bishop of Laon, through incautious familiarity with the wife whom he had left, a familiarity that had arisen from a good beginning, finally, such is human frailty, had mingled body with her. But afterwards he returned to his senses and confessed to St. Remigius of Reims, and had been shut into a very narrow place like a tomb. After he had done most severe penance there for seven years, Hincmar says this in the life of St. Remigius:
In the seventh year, on the vigil of the Lord’s Supper, when the same Genebald was spending the night in the Lord’s prayer and weeping for himself, around the middle of the night an angel of the Lord came with great light to him in the oratory where he lay prostrate, and said to him: “Genebald, the prayers of your father Remigius have been heard for you. The Lord has received your penance, and your sin has been forgiven. Rise, go out from here, and perform the office of episcopal ministry, and reconcile to the Lord those doing penance for their crimes.” Genebald, struck before by too great a terror, could answer nothing. Then the angel of the Lord strengthened him and urged him not to fear but to rejoice in the mercy of the Lord bestowed on him. Animated, he said to the angel: “I cannot go out from here, because my lord and father Remigius has with him the key of this door, which he sealed with his seal.” And the angel said to him: “So that you may not doubt that I have been sent by the Lord, just as heaven lies open to you, so also this door will lie open.” And immediately, with the seal and wax unharmed, that door was opened.
Behold for you the indications of a true vision: first disturbance, soon consolation, and a true and open miracle, the integrity of the seal and wax. Nevertheless the holy man judged that nothing should be detracted from obedience.
Then Genebald, throwing himself in the doorway in the form of a cross, said: “Even if the Lord Jesus Christ himself should deign to come to me, a sinner, I shall not go out from here until the one who placed me in this enclosure in his name shall have come.” And immediately the angel of the Lord withdrew from him.
Therefore Genebald’s mind pleased God, and through the angel he made all these things manifest that same night to St. Remigius, who was spending the night in prayer at Reims. He ordered him to go to Laon and restore Genebald to the episcopal see, which was done by him at once.
[margin: Hincmar, life of St. Remigius, in Surius, January 13, on Genebald’s vision, obedience, and restoration]
By contrast, Duke William of Aquitaine, if he had judged and repressed at the beginning the suggestions of the demon by which the fervor of devotion was diminished and he was called back to secular things, would not have thrust himself forward as leader to the people of Lucca, nor would he have been struck with blindness. But this deception made him more cautious afterwards, so that he easily scorned the falsity of a second revelation.
The most prudent old man Abramius, as Blessed Ephrem handed down, when the demon proclaimed him holy and blessed, immediately struck down those revelations by the contrary act of humility. Ah! The opposite was that girl of Gaudentium in our own times. The wretched woman had long devoted herself to prayer and had frequented the sacraments; but either she had not obtained a confessor sufficiently exercised, or, if she had obtained one, she did not disclose her spiritual secrets to him, or she did not believe him when he warned her well. Whichever of these it was, the Devil gradually puffed her up with the spirit of pride through various revelations. At last he persuaded her that in merits she was equal to the Virgin Mother of God; that only fertility joined to untouched virginity was lacking to her; if she continued, she would obtain that also. What a crafty invention, and one suited to a woman’s temperament!
Now she thought herself not in need of confession. Therefore, for some years she omitted it, though she did not abstain from the sacred synaxis. What more? Once, while she was in church and was waiting for communion, she asked more ardently for that remaining benefit. She heard: “Be of good heart, beloved; know that you have obtained what you asked. The prerogative of fertility with chastity, which you seek, has been granted to you. Trust that you have been impregnated from heaven.” For she had mingled herself with the demon who falsely claimed to be an angel of light.
Having returned home, she felt her womb swell. When the proper time of birth arrived, she went to a certain pious and prudent citizen well known to her, narrated the whole matter, asked that she be permitted to give birth in the inner rooms of his house, and stipulated that the matter be kept secret. He, neither credulous toward her sayings about the revelation, nor yet willing to exclude the virgin from his house, feared that, with the sectarians already beginning to rage, the matter, if made public, would supply material for the blasphemous jeers and insults of heretics. He received her, and, with a trustworthy midwife brought in, waited for the birth.
The wretched woman was violently tormented by pains. At last, at last, instead of human offspring, she poured from her womb a great abundance of horrible, hairy, most foul worms. Their appearance was so dreadful that all shuddered; their odor so foul that they were nearly killed by the stench. Thus at last the wretched woman understood that she had been deceived and that she had received from the prince of the proud the fruit of her pride, as she ought.
[margin: Theobald, life of Duke William of Aquitaine, chapter 16, in Surius for February 2; Blessed Ephrem on Abramius, chapter 19 in the same place; Del Rio’s contemporary Gaudentium example]
Thus a woman was deceived; but that deceitful serpent also supplanted men. In Gregory of Tours these things are read about St. Friard and his companion Secundellus:
St. Friard remained motionless on the above-named island with Secundellus the deacon. Yet each of them had his own cell, placed far apart. When they were standing vigorously in prayer, the tempter appeared by night to Secundellus the deacon under the appearance of the Lord, saying: “I am Christ, whom you continually pray to. For now you are holy, and I have written your name in the book of life with my other saints. Now go out from this island, and going among the people perform healings.” Enticed by these deceptions, he departed from the island and did not tell his companion. Yet when he laid hands on the sick in the name of Christ, they were healed. Returning to the island after much time, he came to his companion with empty glory, saying: “I went outside the island and performed many powers among the people.” When the terrified companion asked what this meant, he simply disclosed all that he had done. But the old man, astonished, sighing, and weeping, said: “Woe to us, because, so far as I hear, you have been deceived by the tempter. Go, do penance, lest his deceits prevail further over you.”
See here the fall: first, because from hidden pride he believed himself holy, and from this inscription, as it were, he did not recognize the deceitful contrivance; second, because he departed from the good purpose of remaining on that island; third, because he kept his counsels secret from his teacher and neglected to obey him. Now see how, conquered, he conquered, relying on humility, obedience, and prayer. It follows in Gregory of Tours:
When Secundellus understood this and feared that he had perished, he prostrated himself with tears at the old man’s feet, asking that he pray to the Lord for him. Friard said to him: “Come, and let us together beg his omnipotence for the salvation of your soul. For the Lord is not difficult in showing mercy to those who confess him, since he himself says through the prophet: ‘I do not wish the death of the sinner, but that he be converted and live.’” While they were praying, the tempter came again under a similar appearance to Secundellus the deacon, saying: “Did I not instruct you, because my sheep were diseased and needed a shepherd, to go out and visit them and give them the help of healings?” And he said: “In truth I have discovered that you are a seducer, and I do not believe you to be God, whose appearance you falsely claim to have. Yet if you are Christ, show that cross of yours which you left behind, and I shall believe you.” When he did not show it, the deacon made a cross on his face, and he vanished in confusion.
And behold, you have counsel which you can use in similar doubts: ask that he sign himself with the cross, or that, with a cross formed, he bless you.
[margin: Gregory of Tours, Lives of the Fathers, chapter 10, cited in Surius, August 1, on St. Friard and Secundellus, the false Christ apparition, and the cross-sign test]
In similar fashion, a demon appeared to St. Matrona in the form of a beautiful woman and advised her to leave the desert and go to the city, saying that there would be less danger there to her modesty. But the blessed woman at once understood the snares of the enemy from the fact that he was dissuading her from a stricter life. Simeon Metaphrastes tells this in her life under the month of November.
So too, when St. Marcellus the abbot was going to drive demons out of possessed persons, and they cried out several times, “Order us to go out, because you have received power over us,” he commanded nothing, but persevered in prayer until, compelled by God, they withdrew. When people asked why he had not commanded them at once, he answered very prudently: “By saying that I had received power over them, they were doing nothing other than trying to entangle me in the snares of vainglory.” The usefulness of this lesson is very great not only in exorcisms but in all revelations, because in these the danger of vainglory is very great, as we saw in Secundellus.
The Holy Spirit himself, when by a marvelous vision he insinuated himself to Blessed Angela of Foligno, and had praised her, and she had on that very account regarded the matter with suspicion, because she was being exposed to the danger of vainglory, assigned to her as a sure sign of a tested revelation this fact: that the more she was praised, the more frequently and more sharply the memory of all her past sins came to her, and she could give no place to vainglory, even when she tried. She herself narrates this at length in chapter 19, and writes that she experienced the same elsewhere too, in chapters 21, 22, and 29.
[margin: Simeon Metaphrastes, in the life of St. Matrona, month of November; Simeon Metaphrastes, in the life of St. Marcellus, December 29; Blessed Angela of Foligno, chapters 19, 21, 22, and 29]
This also must be observed: the frauds of the demon are many-shaped on every side. Sometimes he persuades what is best; then the danger of pride lies beneath it, and this pest must be very carefully guarded against. Sometimes he persuades what is good; but then one must consider whether, by this good, some greater good is impeded.
If Blessed Jordan, master general of the Order of Preachers, had observed this latter point, the Devil would not several times have imposed upon him by this device. Once, to render him unfit and feeble for preaching, the Devil impelled him, under the appearance of giving good example and of a stricter life, to abandon things necessary for his little body, and reduced him to the greatest weakness of strength. At other times, too, he deceived him again and again under this pretext. Because this history will be useful to religious persons, it deserves to be read in several places. Thus Leander Albertus writes of him when he was suffering from very acute fevers:
It happened that with the venerable father there was a certain prior of one of the monasteries of our order, a discreet man, alert, provident, learned in letters and composed in morals, who had once applied himself to medicine. Knowing the mind of Father Jordan, and knowing that in illness he was very severe with himself, he said: “Father, a sick man must submit himself in all things to physicians, if he wishes to recover his former health. Therefore, although you are prefect and head of our religion, yet while sick lay aside the authority of your prefecture; you must submit yourself to me and obey. If you do this, I do not fear that you will shortly go out from here well.”
The venerable father humbly agreed. Therefore, contrary to the custom of our order, while the sick man rested on feathers, as the prudent prior had ordered, the Devil appeared at night, presenting an angelic form, and said, as though wondering: “Is this Jordan, so famous and distinguished in the opinion of all? Is this the prefect and father of such a notable order of Preachers? I would be in doubt, if I had not known you before. O how base and shameless you have become, you who rest like one of the lords of the earth upon feathers and adorned silks! O unhappy man, what an example you give to your order and brothers! But God has not forgotten you in the end; he has sent me to correct you. Rise therefore from the bed, and immediately lie suppliant on the ground.”
When the Devil had immediately vanished, Jordan, terrified, fell on the ground; and lying thus, when day had dawned, he was found by the prior and the brothers. The prior, severely rebuking him, compelled him by the merit of obedience to lie on the bed that had been prepared. The next night the Devil stood there again, having assumed the former form, and reproved him more harshly than before as disobedient to him, and soon ordered him to leap down onto the ground. When the prior saw him again in the morning lying on the ground, he was especially indignant and said: “I wonder at your simplicity, not to say your ignorance, since you have dared to do this against obedience, not only to the prejudice of the body, but also of the soul. For I call to witness the God of heaven, the Lord of earth, that I would not have wished, for the whole globe of lands, to have sinned so gravely against God and the order.” Saying this, he burst into great tears.
Seeing this, the venerable father also wept, fell at his feet, and narrated to him the visions, or rather illusions, and how, as he was able to conjecture, this had been the Devil, who had been transformed into an angel of light. The prior, seized with wonder and with a kind of compassion, and somewhat softened, ordered him to climb onto the bed. For from this he had contracted such great weakness of his limbs, and his humors had so hardened, that he scarcely had breath enough to rest. On the third night the Devil came, as before. When the holy man saw him, for he had now broken out into rebukes, he said: “O most wicked enemy of the human race, O shameless dog, O unclean beast, how have you dared to mock my simplicity, pretending some zeal toward the order? Indeed, if the dispensation of almighty God had not permitted this, I would have observed more wisely that obedience is much better than the vilest thing belonging to fools.” And spitting in his face, he put him to flight.
See: the holy man, deceived by the empty appearance of good, recovered his wisdom by fortifying himself with the solid good of obedience. Notice also that last point, that he spat in the face of the one appearing in angelic form. Spiritual men recommend this too when a vision is suspect, and I know a man for whom this turned out very well.
[margin: Leander Albertus, life of Blessed Jordan, chapters 21-22, on the false angelic austerity and obedience remedy]
This chapter must be concluded with the testimony of Blessed Meinulph, deacon and confessor, who, appearing himself, taught this rule: true visions are those which lead toward piety and religion. Take the story word for word from Gobelinus Persona:
Not long after his death, he appeared in a dream to a certain chamberlain of his, urging him to bid farewell to the world and its pomps and to betake himself to the army of the eternal king. But the man, holding that vision as nothing other than an illusion, took no care to amend his life. The holy man, adapting himself to the man’s weakness, admonished him again as before. But when not even then did he think at all about ordering his life more rightly, he appeared to him a third time and said: “You do not know, wretched man, you do not know what savage robber claims your mind for himself, since he is your author and adviser that you obey neither the Lord who sent me nor me who have been sent by him. Certainly, since in living badly you are plainly mad and do not wish to withdraw voluntarily from this folly, divine revelation has warned you, so that even in this way you might receive yourself back to a better harvest. But you, fool, allow yourself to be miserably and ruinously mocked, because you regard true revelation as a phantastical illusion. For no one of the faithful doubts that that vision is free from illusion which invites one to Christian piety and religion. If anyone did this to you while you were awake, you ought by no means to neglect it. But when words do not correct you, one must come to deeds. Therefore I shall plainly make you experience by the reality itself that the vision which you pretend not to understand is most true.” When these words had been spoken, the man woke and felt all the hair of his beard plucked from his chin; all sleep fled far from his eyes.
He adds that afterward the man obeyed the vision.
[margin: Gobelinus Persona, life of Blessed Meinulph in Surius, October 5]
The second consideration is that when things pious, good, and right are advised in a vision or revelation, one must then diligently weigh whether, at the same time, some things are being advised that are impious, wicked, vain, or useless. Examples of this sort occur everywhere; I shall be content with a few saints, and you will be too, pious reader.
James of Vitry excellently confirms this teaching when he writes thus:
A certain one among the walls of Blessed Mary of Oignies was sometimes infested by the noonday demon, the more dangerously because more subtly, as that crafty enemy, transfiguring himself into an angel of light, appeared to him familiarly under the appearance of piety, sometimes rebuking some of his vices, and even exhorting him treacherously to do certain good things, so that first, by a false appearance hidden as though under an antidote, he might afterward instill poison through the eyes, and, after blandly licking him with a honeyed tongue, might then fix his tooth in him and at the end tighten his tail like a cedar. For when trust was already had in him as though he were true, then, in the manner of a sophist and impostor, he mixed false things with certain true ones, deceitfully drawing over false things mixed with good a certain shadow of truth.
At last he brought that brother by his machines to such a point that his affairs would have had a very bad outcome if the handmaid of Christ, by the revelation of the Holy Spirit, had not learned the deceits of the crafty cheat. When she told the man that those revelations were not from God but were illusions of a malignant demon, and he on the contrary objected that she was not speaking by a holy spirit but by her own spirit, since that spirit had given him so many benefits, had predicted so many true and future things, and in no way wished to impose on him, she fled to the familiar arms of prayer. She watered the Lord’s feet with tears, struck heaven constantly with prayers, and did not cease until, with much groaning and shame, that impious impostor stood by her the same night as she prayed in her little cell. Looking at him, endowed with a feigned splendor, she said: “Who are you, and what are you called?” He, proud in countenance and looking back at her with threatening eyes, said: “I am the one whom you, cursed woman, have compelled by your prayers to come to you, while you try to tear my friend from me by force. That friend I had withdrawn from a good purpose so that, according to your will, I might drag him back.” And the event itself taught that this was so; but the eggs of vipers were broken, and the fraudulent counsels of that malignant one were brought to light.
By these words are set before us at once the arts of the demon, and the mode, and the end, and the remedy to be used in a doubtful matter. By this remedy Blessed Vincent Ferrer detected and dispelled another illusion of a demon. So also Blessed Guthlac understood and avoided the snares of one advising immoderate fasts. In the same way, under the appearance of helping souls, the Devil persuaded St. Elphege to follow the one leading him out of prison and guiding him, after the example of Blessed Peter following the angel. He persuaded and persuaded in the appearance of an angel, but, after the confessor had been led out, he deserted him in the road. The man understood the fraud, grieved, and offered himself again to the martyrdom which he had fled, and so merited the crown. Under the same pretext, the demon tried to persuade a certain monk to leave his cell, but he was deceived by Blessed Arsenius.
[margin: James of Vitry, book 1 of the life of Blessed Mary of Oignies, chapter 9; Peter Ranzano, life of Blessed Vincent Ferrer; Surius, in the life of Blessed Guthlac, April 11; Surius on St. Elphege of Canterbury; Simeon Metaphrastes on Arsenius]
For this reason, the teaching of the same Blessed Arsenius must be carefully noted and faithfully retained, because, as if in a mirror, he set before us the images of the demonic contest and the chief heads of the snares. Because this matter belongs to this chapter and is especially useful, I shall present it word for word:
Let this not escape you either, brothers: our enemy the Devil, using many and various devices, tries to deceive us and to drive us into evils under the pretext of good. For example, by suggesting hospitality and consequently the welcome and kind reception of brothers who arrive, he brings it about that they eat and drink together; the cause, however, is the good of charity. Then, gradually stealing and drawing imprudent men away, he leads us to serve the belly, and afterward pollutes us with the satiety of lust and with pleasures.
Again, by placing almsgiving and kindness to the poor into the minds of others, he injects love of money and drives them into the madness of avarice. To others, offering the usefulness of many as bait, he makes them leave silence and quiet as though useless, and persuades them to have dealings with many worldly persons, and sometimes even with women incautiously, as though they had already begun to become impassible; and so he renders the wretched ones lustful and serving the disturbances of the soul.
To others, showing no trouble and deceitfully procuring that they be captured by no vice, he lifts them into pride and so casts them down with no effort. Sometimes, by making men abstain from battle, especially those who had lately stripped themselves for undertaking the contests of exercise, he deceived them by making them secure and concerned about nothing. From this it happened that, after he had thrown them into sluggishness and made them neglect labors, he suddenly attacked them as easy and unarmed men already conquered, and so with a very great storm shook and disturbed their mind, and often even plunged it into the depth of vices.
Again, after he had persuaded others to trust themselves as though they had already come to a greater measure, he suggested that the thoughts of others and announcements of vices and wars should be believed to them. Since they had not yet rightly washed away their own vices, he first cast in the recollection and representation of the things they had heard, not without disturbance of soul; then he also wretchedly drove them toward the contamination of the flesh.
After enumerating these things, he adds that, because of the many harms of so many stratagems, we have need of much guarding of ourselves, sobriety, watchfulness, and attention to the good.
[margin: Simeon Metaphrastes on Arsenius and the catalogue of demonic stratagems under pretexts of good]
The third consideration is Gerson’s: one must consider whether that which was revealed could have been attained by human understanding without revelation. In that case it should be suspected as superfluous and not at all necessary. But if it was about things which exceed both human understanding and the demon’s knowledge, then the revelation could not have been sent from anywhere but above. Yet whether the matters are of this kind is difficult to judge at once, because this cannot be detected except by the passage of time, when the event of a prediction declares the truth, or by careful discussion, when a hidden thought is revealed: whether that matter belongs only to divine knowledge, or also to the demon’s or a human being’s. The prophecies of Savonarola labored under this fault, by his own confession.
The fourth consideration: one must see whether it is not so much drawn from Sacred Scripture, for then it would be suspect, as consonant with it in every respect, and consistent also with the doctrine and examples of holy men, having nothing false or erroneous mixed in, and wholly pertaining to the salvation of human beings and the glory of God. These are the illustrious proofs of divine revelation.
The fifth consideration is whether the revelation is confirmed by other undoubted revelations. For if there are no other certain ones, the matter remains doubtful. For the Devil can reveal the same thing often as he has once, and to many as to one. From this head there are many traces in ecclesiastical histories of certain revelations: such was that marvelous one of Blessed Hermann of Steinfeld, who was also called Joseph, because the Blessed Virgin Mary, seen by him in dreams together with an angel as paranymph, was betrothed to him, in a most brilliant example of virginal kindness. The delightful description is contained in that blessed man’s life. Such too was another of the patriarch Eutychius, in Eustathius in his life. Such was another offered to Blessed William of Roskilde at his death and explained by Leo, in Surius on April 6. Such too were many of the one whom I praised a little earlier, Blessed Meinulph; many such are also in Peter the Venerable’s books of miracles.
Confirmation by others should be judged stronger than confirmation by the same person; likewise by unknown persons than by known ones, by men than by women.
[margin: Gerson, On the Testing of Spirits; Surius on Blessed Hermann of Steinfeld, Eutychius, Blessed William of Roskilde, April 6, and Blessed Meinulph, October 5; Peter the Venerable, Miracles, book 1, chapters 23 and 27]
The sixth consideration: if there are conflicting revelations about the same matter, for the most part both should be held suspect. Yet sometimes the Devil tries to weaken true revelations by offering contrary ones. Therefore not all should be rejected at once, but, after the matter has been maturely deliberated, one should believe those which are not the earlier ones, for it often happens that when the demon has tried to mock by a false revelation, God sends in another true one and scatters that cloud by the arrival of light. One should rather believe those which more numerous and more tested persons confirm by holiness, prudence, and sacred doctrine, and whose authors had less cause to invent such things.
For example, in revelations concerning the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God, when the remaining weights of the circumstances are equal, more should be attributed to revelations had, if such exist, before the controversy about the same matter arose; and after the controversy arose, to those had by persons who belonged neither to the institute of St. Thomas nor to the other institute of which the Subtle Doctor was a member. For these are freer from affection. And in this respect the revelation of St. Bridget plainly outweighs the other which is attributed to St. Catherine of Siena.
[margin: Revelations of St. Bridget and the revelation attributed to St. Catherine of Siena in the Immaculate Conception controversy]