The Phantom World; or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c.Calmet, Augustin
Religion
The Phantom World; or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c.
Calmet, Augustin
Apparitions; Demonology; Spirits
Michael returned to his companions, who were still at play, and not
only regained all the money he had lost, but won all that of his
companions. Then he went in search of his demon, who asked as his
reward three drops of his blood, which he received in an acorn-cup;
after which, presenting a pen to Michael, he desired him to write what
he should dictate. He then dictated some unknown words, which he made
him write on two different bits of paper,[102] one of which remained
in the possession of the demon, the other was inserted in Michael's
arm, at the same place whence the demon had drawn the blood. And the
demon said to him, "I engage myself to serve you during seven years,
after which you will unreservedly belong to me."
The young man consented to this, though with a feeling of horror; and
the demon never failed to appear to him day and night under various
forms, and taught him many unknown and curious things, but which
always tended to evil. The fatal termination of the seven years was
approaching, and the young man was then about twenty years old. He
returned to his father's house, when the demon to whom he had given
himself inspired him with the idea of poisoning his father and mother,
of setting fire to their chateau, and then killing himself. He tried
to commit all these crimes, but God did not allow him to succeed in
these attempts. The gun with which he wished to kill himself missed
fire twice, and the poison did not take effect on his father and
mother.
More and more uneasy, he revealed to some of his father's domestics
the miserable state in which he found himself, and entreated them to
procure him some succor. At the same time the demon seized him, and
bent his body back, so that he was near breaking his bones. His
mother, who had adopted the heresy of Suenfeld, and had induced her
son to follow it also, not finding in her sect any help against the
demon that possessed or obseded him, was constrained to place him in
the hands of some monks. But he soon withdrew from them and retired to
Islade, from whence he was brought back to Molsheim by his brother, a
canon of Wurzburg, who put him again into the hands of fathers of the
society. Then it was that the demon made still more violent efforts
against him, appearing to him in the form of ferocious animals. One
day, amongst others, the demon, wearing the form of a hairy savage,
threw on the ground a schedule, or compact, different from the true
one which he had extorted from the young man, to try by means of this
false appearance to withdraw him from the hands of those who kept him,
and prevent his making his general confession. At last they fixed on
the 20th of October, 1603, as the day for being in the Chapel of St.
Ignatius, and to cause to be brought the true schedule containing the
compact made with the demon. The young man there made profession of
the Catholic and orthodox faith, renounced the demon, and received the
holy sacrament.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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