A rubric of the “De exorcizandis Obsessis a Daemonio” prescribes: “Necessarie uero interrogationes sunt, ut de tempore quo ingressi sunt, de causa, et aliis huiusmodi. Ceteras autem daemoniis nugas, risus, et ineptias Exorcista cohibeat, aut contemnat, et circumstantes, qui pauci esse debent, admoneat, ne haec curent, neque ipsi interrogent obsessum: sed potius humiliter et enixe Deum pro eo precentur.” ↩
Bishop of Naples, who was appointed to that see by S. Gregory the Great in 593 upon the deposition of Demetrius. ↩
S. Matthew 17:20: Hoc autem genus non eiicitur nisi per orationem et ieiunium. ↩
See Sinistrari, De Daemonialitate, LXVIII, in my translation “Demoniality,” pp. 52–53. ↩
Paul de Santa Maria, a Spanish Archbishop, Lord Chancellor, and exegete, born at Burgos about 1351; died 29 August, 1435. The most wealthy and influential Jew of Burgos (Jewish name Solomon-Ha-Levi), and a scholar of the first rank in Talmudic and Rabbinical literature, a Rabbi of the Hebraic community, he was converted to Christianity by the irrefutable logic of the Summa of S. Thomas. He received baptism 21 July, 1390. His reputation as a Biblical writer chiefly rests upon his “Additiones” to the Postilla of Nicolas of Lyra, Nuremberg, 1481; Venice, 1481; and many other editions. ↩
William Duranti, canonist and one of the most important medieval liturgical writers, born about 1237 at Puimisson, Provence; died at Rome 1 November, 1296. His career was most noble and distinguished. A long epitaph upon his monument in Santa Maria sopra Minerva tells the story of his life and gives a list of his works. The most important of these is the Rationale diuinorum officiorum, the first edition of which by Fust and Schoeffer as issued at Mainz in 1459. It has been frequently reprinted, the last complete edition being Naples, 1839. The Speculum Iudiciale and the Commentarius in canones Concilii Lugdunensis II are valuable treatises upon the canons and canonical processes. ↩
The miracle of the removal of a mountain was actually performed by S. Gregory Thaumaturgus, Bishop of Neocaesarea (d. circa 270–275), as the Venerable Bede tells us in his Commentary upon S. Mark 11: “Hoc quoque fieri potuisset, ut mons ablatus de terra mitteretur in mare, si necessitas id fieri poscisset. Quomodo legimus factum precibus beati patris Gregorii Neocaesareae Ponti Antistitis, uiri mentis et uirtutibus eximii, ut mons in terra tantum loco cederet, quantum incolae ciuitatis opus habebant. Cum enim uolens aedificare ecclesiam in loco apto, uident eum angustiorem esse quam res exigebat, eo quod ex una parte rupe maris, ex alia monte proximo coarctaretur; uenit nocte ad locum, et genibus flexis admonuit Dominum promissionis suae, ut montem longius iuxta fidem petentis ageret. Et mane facto reuersus inuenit montem tantum spatii reliquisse structoribus ecclesiae, quantum opus habuerant.” ↩
Actually baptismal exorcism is earlier than S. Gregory. From the very first catechumens were exorcised as a preparation for the Sacrament of Baptism. In this connection exorcism is a symbolical anticipation of one of the chief effects of the Sacrament of Regeneration, and since it was used in the case of children who had no personal sins, S. Augustine, writing against the Pelagians, appeals to it as clearly implying the doctrine of original sin. S. Cyril of Jerusalem in his Catecheses, AD 347, gives a detailed description of baptismal exorcism, by which it appears that anointing with exorcised oil formed a part of this function in the East. The earliest Western witness which explicitly treats unction as part of the baptismal exorcism is that of the Arabic Canons of Hippolytus. ↩
The De Auguriis, which is often ascribed to another writer, may be found in the Migne S. Augustine, Ap. V, 2268. ↩
Cf. Shirley’s comedy The Sisters, licensed April 1642, where Antonio says to one of the supposed astrologers, III, I:
“You are one of the knaves that stroll the country,
And live by picking worms out of fools’ fingers.”
1 Corinthians 10:31. ↩
So in Ireland the fairies are called “good people,” and traditionally seem to be of a benevolent and capricious and even mischievous disposition. In some parts of Highland Scotland fairies are called “daoine sithe” or “men of peace,” and it is believed that every year the devil carries off a tenth part of them.
It will be readily remembered that to the Greeks the Fairies were αἱ Εὐμενίδες, the gracious goddesses. ↩
Esarhaddon is employing a mode of sortilege by arrows, belomancy, which was extensively practised among the Chaldeans, as also among the Arabs. Upon this text S. Jerome comments: “He shall stand in the highway, and consult the oracle after the manner of his nation, that he may cast arrows into a quiver, and mix them together, being written upon or marked with the names of each people, that he may see whose arrow will come forth, and which city he ought first to attack.” The arrows employed by the Arabs were often three in number, upon the first of which was inscribed, “My Lord hath commanded me”; upon the second, “My Lord hath forbidden me”; and the third was blank. If the inquirer drew the first it was an augury of success; the second gave an omen of failure; if the third were drawn, all three were mixed again and another trial was
