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OF THE ROMAN EMPIEE 17 eternal order of the planets and the voluntary operations of the human mind. They dreaded the mysterious power of spells and incantations, of potent herbs, and execrable rites ; which could extinguish or recall life, inflame the passions of the soul, blast the works of creation, and extort from the reluctant demons the secrets of futurity. They believed, with the wildest inconsistency, that this preternatural dominion of the air, of earth, and of hell, was exercised, from the vilest motives of malice or gain, by some wrinkled hags and itinerant sorcerers, who passed their obscure lives in penury and contempt. "^^ The arts of magic were equally condemned by the public opinion and by the laws of Rome ; but, as they tended to gratify the most imperious passions cf the heart of man, they were con- tinually proscribed, and continually practised.^"^ An imaginary cause is capable of producing the most serious and mischievous effects. The dark predictions of the death of an emperor, or the success of a conspiracy, were calculated only to stimulate the hopes of ambition and to dissolve the ties of fidelity ; and the intentional guilt of magic was aggravated by the actual crimes of treason and sacrilege.^^ Such vain terrors disturbed the peace of society and the happiness of individuals ; and the harmless flame which insensibly melted a waxen image might derive a powerful and pernicious energy from the affrighted fancy of the person whom it was maliciously designed to re- present. ^2 From the infusion of those herbs which were ^The Canidia of Horace (Carm. 1. v. od. 5 with Dacier's and Sanadon's illustra- tions) is a vulgar witch. The Erichtho of Lucan (Pharsal. vi. 430-830) is tedious, disgusting, but sometimes sublime. She chides the delay of the Furies, and threatens, with tremendous obscurity, to pronounce their real names, to reveal the true infernal countenance of Hecate, to invoke the secret powers that lie below hell, &c. 50 Genus hominum potentibus infidum, sperantibus fallax, quod in civitate nostra et vetabitur semper et retinebitur. Tacit. Hist, i, 22. See Augustin. de Civitate Dei, 1. viii. c. 19, and the Theodosian Code, 1. ix. tit. xvi. with Godefroy's Commentary. 51 The persecution of Antioch was occasioned by a criminal consultation. The twenty-four letters of the alphabet were arranged round a magic tripod ; and a dancing ring, which had been placed in the centre, pointed to the first four letters in the name of the future emperor, 0. E. O. A. Theodorus (perhaps with many others who owned the fatal syllables) was executed. Theodosius succeeded. Lardner (Heathen Testimonies, vol. iv. p. 3S3-372) has copiously and fairly ex- amined this dark transaction of the reign of Valens. 52Limus ut hie durescit, et hasc ut cera liquescit Uno eodemque igni Virgil. Bucolic, viii. 80. Devovet absentes, simulacraque cerea figit. Ovid, in Epist. Hypsip. ad Jason. [Her. vi.] 91. Such vain incantations could affect the mind and increase the disease of Germani- cus. Tacit. Annal. ii. 69. VOL. III. 2