Europe's inner demons

I conjure, charge, and command you, and everie of you, Sitrael, Malantha,Thamaor, Falaur

, and Sitrama

, you infernall kings, to put into this christall stone one spirit learned and expert in all arts and sciences, by the vertue of this name of God Tetragrammaton, and by the crosse of our Lord Jesu Christ, and by the bloud of the innocent lambe, which redeemed all the world, and by all their vertues & powers I charge you, ye noble kings, that the said spirit may teach, shew, and declare unto me, and to my freends, at all houres and minuts, both night and daie. the truth of all things, both bodilie and ghostlie. in this woijd. whatsoever I shall request or desire, declaring also to me my verie name. And this I command in your part to doo, and to obeie thereunto, as unto your owne lord and maister. That done, they will call a certeine spirit, whom they will command to enter into the centre of the circled or round christall. Then put the christall between the two circles, and thou' shalt see the christall made blacke.

Then command them to command the spirit in the christall, not to depart out of the stone, till thou give him licence, & to fulfill thy will for ever.... And then take up thy christall, and looke therein, asking what thou wilt, and it will shew it unto thee.... And when the spirit is inclosed, if thou feare him, bind him with some bond…”⁽¹⁸⁾

“If thou feare him…”: demons were dangerous beings, and the ritual was designed not simply to force them to serve the magician but also to protect him from them. The spiritual preparations, the preliminary mortifications and prayers, were meant to ensure that he would remain safe in body and soul. Some of the books of magic even add that unless the magician, when attempting a conjuration, is in a state of grace and has a clear conscience, he may find that instead of commanding the demon he is commanded by it. Similarly, when the magician put on his ceremonial robes, inscribed with the names of God, he was shielding himself against the destructive powers he was about to conjure up. The circle which he drew on the ground with his consecrated sword served the same purpose: it marked out a field of concentrated divine power, a barrier which no demon could cross. So long as the magician remained within the circle, he could operate in safety; but if he stepped outside it, or even allowed a single limb to stray outside, he could be seized by the demons.

It is all a far cry from the great witch-hunt. And at first glance it may seem incredible that the reality of the magician, with his abstruse technical literature, his elaborate professional techniques for mastering and binding demons, his incessant invocation of God, could have contributed anything at all to fantasies about illiterate peasant women sexually seduced by demons and enlisted in the service of Satan. Nevertheless it did contribute something, and that something can be defined.