What Magicians Were Expected to Know in 1652
The following summary of "What Every Magician Ought to Know," is from "The Seven Books of Magic," printed in London in 1652, and bound in one volume. This was known as the "Black Book", and its possession was forbidden by both Church and State.
"Now it is meet to instruct a magician, both what he must know and what he must observe, that being sufficiently instructed, he may bring most strange and wonderful things to pass.
"Seeing Magic is a practical part of Natural Philosophy, therefore it behooveth a Magician, and one that aspires to the dignity of that profession, to be an exact and perfect Philosopher. For Philosophy teaches what are the effects of fire, earth, air and water; the principal matter of the heavens; what is the cause of the flowing of the sea, and of the divers colored Rainbow; and of the loud Thunder, and of Comets and of firy lights that appear by night, and of Earth-quakes; and what are the beginnings of Gold and Iron; and what is the whole force of hidden Nature.
"Then also he must be a skilful Physician, for both these Sciences are very like and near together, and Physic by creeping in under color of Magic have purchased favor among men. And surely it is of great help to us in this kind; for it teaches mixtures and temperatures, and so shows us how to compound and lay things together for such purposes.
"Moreover, it is required of him that he be an Herbalist, not only able to discern common Simples, but skilful and sharp-sighted in the nature of all common plants; for the uncertain names of plants, and their likeness of one to another, so that they can hardly be discerned, have put us to much trouble in some of our works and experiments. And as there is no greater inconvenience to any artificer than not to know his tools that he must work with, so the knowledge of plants is so necessary to this profession.
"He must be as well seen, also, in the nature of Metals, Minerals, Gems and Stones. Furthermore, what cunning he must have in the art of Distillation, which follows and resembles the showers and dews of heaven. I think no man will doubt of it, for it yields daily strange inventions and devices, and shows how to find out many things profitable for the use of man.
"He must also know the Mathematical Sciences, and especially Astrology; for that shows how the stars are moved in the heavens, and what is the cause of the darkening of the Moon; and how the Sun, that golden planet, measures out the parts of the world, and governs it by the twelve Signs; for by the sundry motions and aspects of the heavens, the celestial bodies are very beneficial to the earth; and from thence many things receive active and passive powers, and their manifold properties; the difficulties of which long troubled the minds of the Platonics, how these inferior things receive influence from the heavens.
"Moreover, he must be skilful in the Optics, that he may know how the sight may be deceived, and how the likeness of a vision that is seen in the water, may be seen hanging without in the air by the help of certain Glasses of divers fashions; and how to make one see that plainly which is a great way off; and how to throw fire very far from us; upon which sleights the greater part of the secrecies of Magic doth depend.
"These are the Sciences which Magic takes to herself for servants and helpers; and he that knows not these, is unworthy to be named a Magician. He must be a skilful workman, both by natural gifts, and also by the practice of his own hands; for knowledge without practice and workmanship, and practice without knowledge, are nothing worth; these are so linked together, that the one without the other is but vain, and to no purpose.
"Some there are so apt for these enterprises, even by the gifts of Nature, that God may seem to have made them hereunto. Neither, yet, do I speak this, as if Art could not perfect anything; for I know that good things may be made better, and there are means to remedy and help forward that which lacks perfection.
"First let a man consider and prepare things providentially and skilfully, and then let him fall to work and do nothing unadvisedly. This I thought good to speak of, so that if at any time the ignorant be deceived herein, he may not lay the fault upon us, but upon his own unskilfulness; for this is the infirmity of the scholar and not of the teacher. For if a rude and ignorant man shall deal in these matters, the Science of Magic will be much discredited, and those strange effects will be accounted haphazard, which are most certain and follow their necessary causes.
"If you would have your works appear more wonderful, you must not let the cause be known; for that is a wonder to us, which we see done, and yet know not the cause of it; for he that knows the cause of a thing done, doth not admire the doing of it; and nothing is counted unusual and rare, only so far as the causes thereof are not known."
Originally published in the M-U-M in Vol. 9, No. 10, (Whole No. 84) in New York, March 1920.
