The first suggestion was, that although the devil could not, of his own
inherent power, create a body, he might get hold of a dead carcase and
temporarily restore animation, and so serve his turn. This belief was
held, amongst others, by the erudite King James,[1] and is pleasantly
satirized by sturdy old Ben Jonson in "The Devil is an Ass," where Satan
(the greater devil, who only appears in the first scene just to set the
storm a-brewing) says to Pug (Puck, the lesser devil, who does all the
mischief; or would have done it, had not man, in those latter times, got
to be rather beyond the devils in evil than otherwise), not without a
touch of regret at the waning of his power--
"You must get a body ready-made, Pug,
I can create you none;"
and consequently Pug is advised to assume the body of a handsome
cutpurse that morning hung at Tyburn.
[Footnote 1: Daemonologie, p. 56.]
But the theory, though ingenious, was insufficient. The devil would
occasionally appear in the likeness of a living person; and how could
that be accounted for? Again, an evil spirit, with all his ingenuity,
would find it hard to discover the dead body of a griffin, or a harpy,
or of such eccentricity as was affected by the before-mentioned Balam;
and these and other similar forms were commonly favoured by the
inhabitants of the nether world.
47.
Pages:
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65