The conclusions which Agrippa drew were not so strange to the eyes of his contemporaries as they are to ours. Long before him, men of character and attainments, such as Pic de la Mirandola and Bessarion, had attempted to introduce the Platonic idea, that the best means of acquiring science and truth were introspective. They were, moreover, persuaded that a great number of phenomena and events have their origin in astral influences. From this system to the extravagance of the Cabal * is but{141} a step; indeed, the Christian doctrine, that events and phenomena are influenced by the direct intervention of the deity or of the devil, is but a small transposition. The cabalistic theory, summed up, was that all the events of life and all the phenomena of nature proceed from influences which gods, devils, or the stars exercised on the "archetype"'--that is, on the essential spirit, or substance. He who could withdraw his spirit possessed supernatural faculties. The day and the hour of birth, according to this view, were under the domination of particular stars and each of the principal members of the body was supposed to correspond with some planet or constellation. This is the fundamental idea underlying the pictures--which are still to be found on almanacs used by quack-medicine firms--of the individual whose interior is so completely and uncomfortably exposed, while around him are arranged the signs of the zodiac, with indications as to which part of the body is governed by each. * Cabal, or Kabbalah: A theosophieal or mystic speculative system, of Hebrew origin, which flourished from the tenth to the sixteenth century. It included a mystic theosophy and cosmogony, attributing to deity neither will, desire, nor action, but teaching that from it emanated wisdom, grace, intellect, power, beauty, firmness, and other attributes. It also ascribed hidden meanings to the sacred Hebrew writings and words. Even in the letters and forms of the sacred words the followers of the cabal pretended to find wonderful and hidden meanings; hence the modern expression "cabalistic." The teachings of the cabal were esoteric, of course, and inculcated mysticism and occultism in everything, but appear to have been more or less influenced by neoplatonism. Occult philosophy, built upon this foundation, was divided into four branches: _theosophy,_ to which a man raised himself by prayer; _magic_, or the art of controlling demons; _astrology_, or the art of reading future events by the stars; and _alchemy_, which teaches the secret of extracting the essence or the archetype of substances,--i.e., virtually the secret of the philosopher's stone, by which metals were to be transmuted and then abolished.