I come now to the _practice_ of Marcus. He openly pretended supernatural powers, communicated to him by a familiar spirit, which he flattered his followers, chiefly women, by professing to communicate to them(716). The Eucharist he found especially suited to his purpose, and was the first apparently who taught any thing like transubstantiation. He used, like the Church, wine mingled with water, but pretended to bring down into it by his prayers, the blood of the supernal Grace; and accordingly, lengthening out his devotion, that the chemical agents, which he doubtless employed, might have time to act, he at length produced the liquid, of a much deeper colour than when he began his incantations. In another of his tricks he gave his female friends a part. He requested one of them to take the mingled cup, and to offer the prayer of benediction; whereupon he poured the contents of it into a much larger cup, which he himself held, which, as he pronounced the mystical blessing upon the woman he employed, gradually became full with the contents of the smaller, and at length overflowed(717). This again was, in all probability, effected by some chemical agent, deposited in the bottom of the larger cup, and producing a gradual effervescence: but in those days of ignorance it stamped the worker of such wonders as something more than ordinary man. In communicating, as he pretended, to his devotees a portion of the grace he possessed, he purposely contrived, in the most subtle manner, to inflame their sensual desires, and to direct them towards himself, without using a single word or act to which he could not immediately give a mystical meaning; so that, if his wishes did not succeed, there was nothing with which he could be charged, without subjecting the person who so charged him to the imputation of having put an unholy meaning upon holy things. And if they did succeed, the victim, if not conscience‐seared, would feel self‐corrupted and self‐betrayed. In this way he became master, not only of the persons, but also of the substance of many women of wealth and station(718). To make his arts, however, the more successful, he administered to them inflammatory drugs(719): and still more to guard himself from their defection, under the terror of conscience, and the dread of future judgment, he taught them a form of words, to be addressed to their mother Achamoth, whom he represents as seated with God on his throne, by means of which they would be rendered invisible to the Judge, and pass unhurt to their heavenly spouses the angels(720).