Dæmonologia Sacra; or, A Treatise of Satan's Temptations: In Three PartsGilpin, Richard
Religion
Dæmonologia Sacra; or, A Treatise of Satan's Temptations: In Three Parts
Gilpin, Richard
Devil -- Early works to 1800; Temptation -- Early works to 1800
And I shall begin with that of Gal. iii. 1, ‘O foolish Galatians, who
hath bewitched you, that you should not obey the truth?’ &c. The word
which the apostle here useth for bewitching, as grammarians and critics
note,[221] is borrowed from the practice of witches and sorcerers, who
use by secret powers to bind the senses, and to effect mischiefs. It
is true he speaks of false apostles, but he intends Satan as the chief
workman; and this he transfers to signify Satan’s power upon the mind,
in blinding the understanding for the entertainment of error. Neither
can anything be objected why this place should not prove a fascinating
power in Satan, such as we have been speaking of, but this, that it
may be supposed to intend no more than an ordinary powerful persuasion
by arguments. Yet this may be answered, not only from the authority of
learned interpreters, who apprehend the apostle and his expression to
intend more, but also from some concomitant particulars in the text. He
calls them ‘foolish Galatians,’ as we translate it, but the original
goes a little higher, to signify a madness; and withal he seems to
be surprised with wonder at the power of Satan upon them, which
had not only prevailed against the truth, but against such evident
manifestations of it as they had when they were so plainly, fully, and
efficaciously instructed; for ‘before their eyes Jesus Christ had been
evidently set forth;’ which expressions and carriage cannot rationally
be thought to befit a common ordinary case.[222]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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