MAGIC abracadabra formed the magical triangle of pagan theosophers, to which extraordinary virtues were attributed. It symbolizes the whole magical science of the ancient world. The trident of Paracelsus was believed by him to have all the virtues which the Cabala attrib- uted to words, and which the hierophants of Alexandria ascribed to the abracadabra. A complete knowledge and mastery of nature is the transcendent claim of magic. To know things secret and future, to command the ele- mental spirits, to heal the sick, to provide charms and talismans which shall mysteriously sway the will of others, render one's self in- vulnerable, and raise tempests, to constrain the devil into service, to evoke the dead, to possess the philosopher's stone and the elixir of life, are the usual objects of magical arts. The highest success can be attained only by the most disinterested purposes and the most un- swerving devotion. Thus those who have been believed to possess the secret of making gold, as Nicolas Flamel, passed lives of poverty and privation, while they made princely dis- tributions of wealth. The practice of magic is traceable to the East, where it still re- mains in vogue. It is proscribed in the books of Moses, which recognize several distinct kinds as practised by the heathen nations. It played an important part in the religious doctrine and ritual of the Persians ; and when the Jews returned from the Babylonish cap- tivity, they brought back Persian ideas with them, and practised in secret the arts which the law forbade. The Greeks, who borrowed the name from the Chaldeans, applied it to all divinations and thaumaturgy. The influence of magic may be traced in the legends of Pro- metheus, Sisyphus, ^Eetes, Circe, and Medea. The Romans were thoroughly imbued with it, and had implicit faith in their auguries and divinations ; and the mythologies of the Ger- mans, Slavs, and Celts show the influence of similar ideas. Christianity renewed the Mosaic interdiction of magical arts, ascribing their marvels to malignant spirits. The crusaders re- garded magic as the peculiar ally of tho infidels in their struggle with the soldiers of the cross. In later times a controversy grew up in the church whether magic practised under celes- tial influences, and with laborious study and research, was lawful ; and among some of the most famous reputed practisers of the art were men high in the church. In the 14th century magic rose into repute as a lawful art, and sov- ereigns maintained magicians at their courts; but public opinion was generally against them, and those of the highest pretensions were apt to be classed with those who had dealings with the devil. Though the legitimacy of magie was disputed, its reality as an art and a sci- ence was scarcely doubted down to the 18th century. It has still in Europe a few learned and respectable professors and adepts, while throughout the Mohammedan and pagan world its reality is almost universally admitted, and 521 VOL. x. 54 MAGIC LANTERN 847 its professors are still numerous. Among its famous adepts and writers are Albertus Mag- nus, Roger Bacon, Arnoldus de Villa Nova, Raymond Lully, Nicolas Flamel, Pico della Mirandola, Basil Valentine, Pietro Pomponaz- zi, Theophrastus Paracelsus, Cornelius Agrip- pa, Dr. Faustus, Michael Nostradamus, Jerome Cardan, Andrea Csesalpinus, Tommaso Campa- nella, John Dee, Jacob Horst, Robert Fludd, Athanasius Kircher, Jacques Gaffarel, William Lilly, Daniel Defoe, and in the present century Eliphas Levi. For the discipline and ceremo- nies of the art, as now maintained, see Eliphas Levi, Dogme et rituel de la haute magie (2 vols., Paris, 1856). For various information on the subject, see Horst, Von der alten und neuen Magie Ursprung, Idee, Umfang und OescUchte (Mentz, 1820) ; Grasse, Bibliotheca Magica et Pneumatica (Leipsic, 1843); Ennemoser, Ge- schichte der Magie (2d ed., Leipsic, 1844; translated into English by William Howitt, London, 1854) ; Salverte, Des sciences occultes (Paris, 1829 ; English translation by A. E. Thompson, London, 1846); J. C. Colquhoun, "History of Magic," &c. (London, 1851); M. Schele De Vere, " Modern Magic " (New York, 1873) ; and Francois Lenormant, La magie chez les Assyriens, &c. (Paris, 1874). MAGIC LANTERN, an optical instrument in tended for exhibiting, by means of lenses, mag- nified images of pictures painted in variously colored transparent gums, on glass slides. It is constructed upon the simple dioptrical prin- ciple of conjugate foci (see OPTICS), in accor- dance with which, when any object, as a pic- ture, is brought upon one side of a convex lens, and at a distance slightly greater than its focal length, such object or picture will be re- produced upon a white screen placed at a cer- tain distance on the opposite side of the lens. In the common form, used for schools or sci- entific purposes, the instrument consists of a large dark lantern, having at top a bent chim- ney for the escape of smoke or heated air, and an opening on one side containing a convex lens on a level with the flame of a strong lamp within ; the side of the lantern opposite the opening being furnished with a parabolic me- Magic Lantern. tallic reflector, for the purpose of collecting the light and throwing it upon the lens. Be- yond this lens, within a horizontal tube, the picture is introduced, and beyond this is a sec- ond convex lens, a little further than its focal length from the picture, and the distance of
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