Lives of the Necromancers (The Greatest Paranormal Legends Throughout the Ages). William Godwin

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      Chaldea and Babylon.

      The history of the Babylonish monarchy not having been handed down to us, except incidentally as it is touched upon by the historians of other countries, we know little of those anecdotes respecting it which are best calculated to illustrate the habits and manners of a people. We know that they in probability preceded all other nations in the accuracy of their observations on the phenomena of the heavenly bodies. We know that the Magi were highly respected among them as an order in the state; and that, when questions occurred exciting great alarm in the rulers, “the magicians, the astrologers, the sorcerers, and the Chaldeans,” were called together, to see whether by their arts they could throw light upon questions so mysterious and perplexing, and we find sufficient reason, both from analogy, and from the very circumstance that sorcerers are specifically named among the classes of which their Wise Men consisted, to believe that the Babylonian Magi advanced no dubious pretensions to the exercise of magical power.

      Zoroaster.

      Among the Chaldeans the most famous name is that of Zoroaster, who is held to have been the author of their religion, their civil policy, their sciences, and their magic. He taught the doctrine of two great principles, the one the author of good, the other of evil. He prohibited the use of images in the ceremonies of religion, and pronounced that nothing deserved homage but fire, and the sun, the centre and the source of fire, and these perhaps to be venerated not for themselves, but as emblematical of the principle of all good things. He taught astronomy and astrology. We may with sufficient probability infer his doctrines from those of the Magi, who were his followers. He practised enchantments, by means of which he would send a panic among the forces that were brought to make war against him, rendering the conflict by force of arms unnecessary. He prescribed the use of certain herbs as all-powerful for the production of supernatural effects. He pretended to the faculty of working miracles, and of superseding and altering the ordinary course of nature. — There was, beside the Chaldean Zoroaster, a Persian known by the same name, who is said to have been a contemporary of Darius Hystaspes.

5. Genesis xli, 8, 25, &c.

6. Exodus, vii. 11; viii. 19.

7. Ibid, xxii. 18.

8. Deuteronomy, xviii. 10,11.

9. Leviticus, xx. 27.

10. Numbers, xxii. 5,6,7.

11. Numbers, xxiv, 1.

12. Ibid, xxiii. 23.

13. 1 Sam. xxviii. 6, et seq.

14. 2 Kings, xxi. 6.

15. 1 Kings, xxii. 20, et seqq.

16. 1 Chron. xxi. 1,7,14.

17. 2 Kings, i. 2,3,4.

18. Matthew, xii. 24.

19. Genesis, xliv. 5.

20. Genesis, xliv. 15.

21. Brewster on Natural Magic, Letter IX.

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