HISTORY (OCCult, 1960s)

[_A History of Witchcraft, Magic and Occultism_, by W.B. Crow,
 Wilshire Book Company, 1968; pp. 228-30, 255; a very extensive
 overview of arcane and supernatural subjects, at times in
 lovely detail with decent citations]

*Pacts with the Devil*.  The authority for such pacts is *Isaias*
(*Isaiah*) xxviii which in the Vulgate translation reads: "For
you have said we have entered into a league with death, and we
have made a covenant with hell."  Both Origen and Augustine
mention these pacts and the scholastic philosophers distinguish
between express and implied pacts.  The former consists in 
actually evoking the demon, the latter in merely expecting help
from him.  The demon here refers to any evil spirit, and there
were vast numbers of such.

When the witch-cult was at its height anyone interested in
joining might receive a visit from one dressed in black.  He
would be the devil, or more correctly the devil's represenative.
He would sometimes get the victim to sign a written pact, and
the signature was almost always in the blood of the person
signing it.  Sometimes the whoel document was in blood. {NOTE:
The drawing of blood for making pacts is not peculiar to the
diabolical ones.  Pacts between friends or between lovers were
sometimes made in this way.  There was sometimes even the
drinking of blood in this connection.}  If the victim could not
write, the sign taking the place of the signature was a circle,
as the usual cross was now taboo.  The pact sometimes had to
be made at cross-roads.  The agreement was that the devil should
give the victim everything he or she desired, in the way of
knowledge, wealth, success, pleasure and vengeance against
enemies, and in return the victim would renounce the Catholic
religion, repudiate his own Baptism, would worship the devil,
abandon all desire for Eternal Salvation and utterly deliver
his own soul to Hell at death.  The pact was to last for seven
or nine years, or for life.  Sometimes the victim died after
the expiration of a number of years, sometimes the pact was
then renewed.

A pact with the devil or with any demons is not legally binding,
according to the opinion of theologians.  Sometimes it was
repudiated and the victims reconciled with the Church....

*The Faust Legend*.  This story is based on old Jewish legends.
{NOTE: H.M. Leon: The Origin and Development of the Faust
Legend, *Proteus* No. 6, April 1932.}  It was first published
by Spiess, 1587.  Soon thereafter it was made into a play:
*The Tragical History of Dr. Faustus* by Marlowe, about 1589.
The best known version was by Goethe, *Faust*, two parts, 
1790-1833, only the first part of which recounts the legend,
the second wandering off into the depths of occult philosophy.
Some other plays on the same theme have been composed, but the
operas are better known *viz.* Spohr: *Faust*, 1816; Berlioz:
*Damnation de Faust*, 1846; Gounod: *Faust e Margoerito*, 1859;
Boito: *Mefistophele*, 1868, and Zollner: *Faust* 1887. 
Wagner wrote a *Faust* overture and Liszt a *Faust* symphony.

It is now believed that an actual person called Dr. Johann
Faust or Faustus existed, that he was an alchemist, astrologer
and magician, born at Knittlingen, Wurttemberg about 1480 and
died about 1538.

In the original legend Faust first appears as an old 
disillusioned man.  He calls up the devil by his magic arts,
agrees to sign a pact whereby he is given twenty-four years
of further life, during which he is to have much knowledge
and unbounded pleasures.  He has a number of adventures, but
at the expiration of the time he is claimed by the devil and
carried down to hell.

In Goethe's *Faust*, Part I, Faust is first seen meditating
in a high-vaulted narrow Gothic chamber, contemplating
suicide.  He is saved by the sound of holiday-makers, singing
an Easter hymn.  He goes for a walk with his assistant Wagner
and they see a poodle which follows Faust home.  Faust
performs magic and the poodle is transformed into a devil
called Mephistopheles.  On a second visit a pact is arranged
and signed in Faust's blood.  Mephistopheles explains that
blood has unique properties.  They then go to a tavern cellar
in Leipzig, where Mephistopheles produces drinks by magic, 
but a brawl ensues.  They next go to a witch's kitchen, where
there is a great cauldron, watched by apes.  The witch arrives
and after fantastic rites gives Faust a drink of the magical
brew.  Soon Faust meets a beautiful maiden Margaret, whom he
tempts with jewels, produced by Mephistopheles, and eventually
seduces.  She kills their newborn child and is cast into 
prison.  Meanwhile Faust and the devil attend the Walpurgis
Night celebrations of the witches on the Harz mountains, and
and Oberon and Titania's Golden Wedding is performed.  Finally
Faust and Mephistopheles try to rescue Margaret from prison,
but she has gone mad and refuses to be rescued.

The second part includes Faust's journey to the Mothers, the
Conjuration of Helen of Troy, the Creation of the Homunculus,
the Classical Walpugis Night and the ultimate salvation of
Faust and Margaret.

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[Ibid, p. 255]

... In the long reign of Louis XIV (*r.* 1643-1715), famed for
splendour, there was a very dark side under the surface.  An
epidemic of poisoning spread from Italy to France.  It was
particularly used to get rid of unwanted husbands.  The poison
was a solution in water of arsenical salt, and it was well 
known under the name of *Aqua Tophania*, after an Italian
murderess who used it on a large scale, or *Manna of St.
Nicholas of Barri*, which was the name used to elude the
customs, it being alleged to be a miraculous medicine oozing
from the tomb of that saint.  Moreover there was an organi-
zation for getting rid of new born babies.  Two women were
running this trade.  They were known as La Voisin and La
Vigoreux.  They termed themselves midwives, and also went in
for fortune-telling.  They were burnt at the stake in 1680.
La Voisin also organized Black Masses.  She had a furnace
at her house for the disposal of the bodies of unwanted
babies, and on some occasions a child was sacrificed during
the Black Mass, its blood being mingled in the Sacred Chalice.

Many priests were executed for celebrating these monstrous
rites.  The altar was covered with black, there were black
candles.  Beneath the altar cloth was a mattress, and when
the rite was celebrated a naked woman was placed on the 
altar, her legs hanging down in front.  Her arms were
stretched out and grasped two of the candlesticks.  Her
head rested on a pillow.  The priest consecrated the bread
and wine in the usual way, but after the consecration they
were polluted in a manner too indecent to describe [likely
either consumption of children's flesh or the hearts of
doves or some sexual fluids - nocT].  Another kind of Black
Mass was one in which the Host was mixed with ashes from a
cremated murdered child, and blood from another.  Then
there was  a Mass of Virility in which blood, flour and
very disgusting substances were mingled with the Sacred
Species, for making love-philtres. {NOTE: J.K. Huysmans:
*La Bas*, Paris, 1891.  Trans. London, 1943. [this text
is a classic in Satanic literature - nocT]}.

[while not the best of retellings, this is a classical
 reference in Satanic legend and history concerning the
 Midwives of Louis the XIV and, at times, their involvement
 in the plot to take his life]
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