THE SECOND PARTITION. THE CURE OF MELANCHOLIE. THE FIRST SECTION. MEMBER. SUBSECTION. Unlawfull Cures rejected.

Inveterate Melancholy, howsoever it may seeme to be a continuate, inexorable disease, hard to be cured, accompanying them to their graves most part, as Montanus observes, yet many times it may be helped, even that which is most violent, or at least, according to the same Author, it may be mitigated and much eased. Nil desperandum. It may be hard to cure, but not impossible for him that is most grievously affected, if he be but willing to be helped.

Upon this good hope I will proceed, using the same method in the Cure, which I have formerly used in the rehearsing of the causes, first General, then Particular; and those according to their severall species. Of these cures some be Lawfull, some again Unlawfull, which though frequent, familiar, and often used, yet justly censured, and to be controverted.

As first, whether by these diabolicall means, which are commonly practised by the devil and his Ministers, Sorcerers, Witches, Magicians, &c. by Spells, Cabalisticall words, Charmes, Characters, Images, Amulets, Ligatures, Philters, Incantations, &c. this disease & the like may be cured? and if they may, whether it be lawfull to make use of them, those magneticall cures, or for our good to seek after such means in any case?

The first, whether they can do any such cures, is questioned amongst many Writers, some affirming, some denying. Valesius cont. med. lib. 5. cap. 6. Malleus Maleficor. Heurnius, l. 3. pract. med. cap. 28. Cælius lib. 16. c. 16. Delrio Tom. 3. Wierus lib. 2. de præstig. dæm. Libanius, Lavater de spect. part. 2. cap. 7. Holbrenner the Lutheran in Pistorium, Polydor Virg. l. 1. de prodig. Tandlerus, Lemnius, (Hippocrates, and Avicenna amongst the rest) deny that spirits or devils have any power over us, and referre all with Pomponatius of Padua to naturall causes and humours.

Of the other opinion are Bodinus Demonamantiæ, lib. 3. cap. 2. Arnoldus, Marcellus Empyricus, Pistorius, Paracelsus Apodix. Magic. Agrippa lib. 2. de occult. Philos. cap. 36. 69. 71. 72. & l. 3. c. 23. & 10. Marcilius Ficinus de vit. cœlit. compar. cap. 13. 15. 18. 21. &c. Galeottus de promiscua doct. cap. 24. Jovianus Pontanus Tom. 2. Plin. lib. 28. c. 2. Strabo, lib. 15. Geog. Leo Suavius. Goclenius de ung. armar. Osvoldus Crollius, Ernestus Burgravius. Dr Flud, &c. Cardan de Subt. brings many proofs out of Ars Notoria, and Solomons decayed works, old Hermes, Artefius, Costaben Luca, Picatrix, &c. that such cures may be done.

They can make fire it shall not burn, fetch back theeves or stolen goods, shew their absent faces in a glasse, make serpents ly still, stanch bloud, salve gouts, epilepsies, biting of mad dogs, tooth-ach, melancholy, & omnia mundi mala, make men immortall, young again as the Spanish Marques is said to have done by one of his slaves, and some, which juglers in China maintain stil (as Tragaultius writes) that they can do by their extraordinary skill in physick, and some of our moderne Chymists by their strange limbecks, by their spells, Philosophers stones and charms.

Many doubt, saith Nicholas Taurellus, whether the devil can cure such diseases he hath not made, and some flatly deny it, howsoever common experience confirms to our astonishment, that Magicians can worke such feats, and that the devil without impediment can penetrate through all the parts of our bodies, and cure such maladies by means to us unknown.

Daneus in his tract de Sortiariis subscribes to this of Taurellus; Erastus de lamiis, maintaineth as much, and so do most divines, that out of their excellent knowledge and long experience they can commit agentes cum patientibus, colligere semina rerum, eaque materiæ applicare, as Austin infers de Civ. Dei & de Trinit. lib. 3. cap. 7. & 8. they can worke stupend and admirable conclusions; we see the effects only, but not the causes of them.

Nothing so familiar as to hear of such cures. Sorcerers are too common; cunning men, wizards, and white-witches, as they call them, in every village, which if they be sought unto, will help almost all infirmities of body and minde, Servitores in Latine, and they have commonly St Catherines wheel printed in the roof of their mouth, or in some other part about them, resistunt incantatorum præstigiis, (Boissardus writes) morbos à sagis motos propulsant, &c. that to doubt of it any longer, or not to beleeve, were to run into that other Sceptical extreme of incredulity, saith Taurellus.

Leo Suavius in his Comment upon Paracelsus seemes to make it an art, which ought to be approved: Pistorius and others stifly maintaine the use of charms, words, characters, &c. Ars vera est, sed pauci artifices reperiuntur; The art is true, but there be but a few that have skill in it.

Marcellus Donatus lib. 2. de hist. mir. cap. 1. proves out of Josephus eight bookes of antiquities, that Solomon so cured all the diseases of the minde by spells, charms, and drove away devils, and that Eleazar did as much before Vespasian. Langius in his med. epist. holds Jupiter Menecrates, that did so many stupend cures in his time, to have used this art, and that he was no other then a Magician. Many famous cures are daily done in this kinde, the devil is an expert Physician, as Godelman calls him, lib. 1. cap. 18. and God permits oftentimes these Witches and Magicians to produce such effects, as Lavater cap. 3. lib. 8. part. 3. cap. 1. Polid. Virg. lib. 1. de prodigiis, Delrio and others admit.

Such cures may be done, and as Paracels. Tom. 4. de morb. ament. stifly maintains, they cannot otherwise be cured but by spels, seales, and spirituall physick. Arnoldus lib. de sigillis, sets down the making of them, so doth Rulandus and many others.

Hoc posito, they can effect such cures, the maine question is whether it be lawfull in a desperate case, to crave their help, or aske a Wisards advice. ’Tis a common practice of some men to go first to a Witch, and then to a Physician, if one cannot the other shall, Flectere si nequeant superos Acheronta movebunt.