Wierus ascribes all those famous transformations, to Imagination: that in Hydrophobia they seem to see the picture of a Dog, still in their water, that melancholy men, and sick men, conceive so many phantastical visions, apparitions to themselves, and have such absurd apparitions, as that they are Kings, Lords, Cocks, Bears, Apes, Owls; that they are heavy, light, transparent, great and little, sensless and dead (as shall be shewed more at large, in our Sections of Symptomes) can be imputed to naught else, but to a corrupt, false, and violent Imagination.

It works not in sick and melancholy men onely, but even most forcibly sometimes in such as are sound: it makes them suddenly sick, and alters their temperature in an instant. And sometimes a strong conceit or apprehension, as Valesius proves, will take away Diseases: in both kindes it will produce real effects. Men if they see but another man tremble, giddy or sick of some fearful disease, their apprehension and fear is so strong in this kinde, that they will have the same Disease.

Or if by some South-sayer, Wiseman, Fortune-teller, or Physitian, they be told they shall have such a Disease, they will so seriously apprehend it, that they will instantly labor of it. A thing familiar in China, (saith Riccius the Jesuite) If it be told them they shall be sick on such a day, when that day comes, they will surely be sick, and will be so terribly afflicted, that sometimes they die upon it.

Dr Cotta in his Discovery of ignorant Practitioners of Physick, cap. 8. hath two strange stories to this purpose, what phansie is able to do. The one of a Parsons wife in Northamptonshire, An. 1607. that coming to a Physitian, and told by him that she was troubled with the Sciatica, as he conjectured, (a disease she was free from) the same night after her return, upon his words, fell into a grievous fit of a Sciatica. And such another example he hath of another good wife, that was so troubled with the cramp, after the same maner she came by it, because her Physitian did but name it.

Sometimes death it self is caused by force of Phantasie. I have heard of one that coming by chance in company of him that was thought to be sick of the Plague (which was not so) fell down suddenly dead. Another was sick of the Plague with conceit. One seeing his fellow let blood, falls down in a sown. Another (saith Cardan out of Aristotle) fell down dead which is familiar to women at any gastly sight) seeing but a man hanged.

A Jew in France (saith Lodovicus Vives) came by chance over a dangerous passage, or plank, that lay over a Brook in the dark, without harm, the next day perceiving what danger he was in, fell down dead. Many will not beleeve such stories to be true, but laugh commonly, and deride when they hear of them; but let these men consider with themselves, as Peter Byarus illustrates it, If they were set to walk upon a plank on high, they would be giddy, upon which they dare securely walk upon the ground.

Many (saith Agrippa) strong hearted men otherwise, tremble at such sights, dazel, and are sick, if they look but down from an high place, and what moves them but conceit? As some are so molested by Phantasie; so some again by Fancy alone, and a good conceit, are as easily recovered.

We see commonly the Tooth-ache, Gout, Falling-sickness, biting of a mad Dog, and many such maladies cured by Spels, Words, Characters, and Charms, and many green wounds by that now so much used Unguentum Armarium, magnetically cured, which Crollius and Goclenius in a book of late hath defended, Libavius in a just Tract as stifly contradicts, and most men controvert.

All the world knows there is no vertue in such Charms, or Cures, but a strong conceit and opinion alone, as Pomponatius holds, which forceth a motion of the humors, spirits, and blood, which takes away the cause of the malady from the parts affected. The like we may say of our Magicall effects, superstitious cures, and such as are done by Mountebanks and Wizards. As by wicked incredulity many men are hurt (so saith Wierus of Charms, Spels, &c.) we finde in our experience, by the same means many are relieved.

An Empirick oftentimes, and a silly Chyrurgian, doth more strange cures, then a rationall Physitian. Nymannus gives a reason, because the Patient puts his confidence in him, which Avicenna prefers before Art, Precepts, and all Remedies whatsoever. ’Tis opinion alone (saith Cardan) that makes, or marrs Physitians, and he doth the best cures, according to Hippocrates, in whom most trust.

So diversly doth this phantasie of ours affect, turn and winde, so imperiously command our bodies, which as another Proteus, or a Cameleon, can take all shapes; and is of such force (as Ficinus adds) that it can work upon others, as well as our selves. How can otherwise blear-eyes in one man, cause the like affection in another? Why doth one mans yawning, make another yawn? One mans pissing provoke a second many times to do the like? Why doth scraping of trenchers offend a third, or hacking of files?

Why doth a Carkass bleed, when the murtherer is brought before it, some weeks after the murther hath been done? Why do Witches and old women, fascinate and bewitch children: but as Wierus, Paracelsus, Cardan, Mizaldus, Valleriola, Cæsar Vanninus, Campanella, and many Philosophers think, the forcible imagination of the one party, moves and alters the spirits of the other.

Nay more, they can cause and cure not only diseases, maladies, and severall infirmities, by this means, as Avicenna de anim. l. 4. sect. 4. supposeth, in parties remote, but move bodies from their places, cause thunder, lightnings, tempests, which opinion Alkindus, Paracelsus, and some others approve of. So that I may certainly conclude, this strong conceit or imagination, is astrum hominis, and the rudder of this our ship, which reason should steer, but overborn by phantasie, cannot manage, and so suffers it self, and this whole vessel of ours to be over-ruled, and often overturned.

Read more of this in Wierus l. 3. de Lamiis, c. 8, 9, 10. Franciscus Valesius med. controv. l. 5. cont. 6. Marcellus Donatus l. 2. c. 1. de hist. med. mirabil. Levinus Lemnius de occult. nat. mir. l. 1. c. 12. Cardan l. 18. de rerum var. Corn. Agrippa de occult. Philos. cap. 64, 65. Camerarius 1. Cent. cap. 54. horarum subcis. Nymannus morat. de Imag. Laurentius, and him that is instar omnium, Fienus, a famous Physitian of Antwerp, that wrote three books de viribus imaginationis.

I have thus far digressed, because this imagination is the medium deferens of passions, by whose means they work and produce many times prodigious effects; and as the phantasie is more or less intended or remitted, and their humours disposed, so do perturbations move more or less, and take deeper impression.