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Make the beginning of the nature of the fecret, either by a fpirit in the form of a perfon, or by virtues feparate, either in human organs, or by what manner foever the fame may be effected; and this being known, require of a fpirit which knoweth that art, that he would briefly declare unto thee whatfover that fecret is: and pray unto God, that he would inspire thee with his grace, whereby thou mayeft bring the fecret the end thou defireft, for the praife and glory of God, and the profit of thy neighbour,

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7. The feventh, to be regenerate, as Henochius the King of the inferior world.

Thefe feven fecrets a man of an honeft and constant mind may learn of the fpirits, without any offence unto God.

The mean fecrets are likewife feven in number.

1. The first is, the tranfmutation of metals, which is vulgarly called Alchymy; which certainly is given to very few, and not but for special grace.

2. The fecond is, the curing of difeafes with metals, either by the magnetic virtues of precious ftones, or by the ufe of the philofophers stone and the like.

3. The third is, to be able to perform Aftronomical and Mathematical miracles, fuch as are Hydraulic-engines, to adminifter bufinefs by the influence of Heaven, and things which are of the like fort.

4. The fourth is, to perform the works of natural Magic, of what fort foever they be.

5. The fifth is, to know all phyfical

fecrets.

6. The fixth is, to know the foundation of all arts which are exer

cifed with the hands and offices of the body.

foundation of all arts which are exer7. The feventh is, to know the cited by the angelical nature of man,

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Curious Method of discovering Murderers.

great things, and to be an head of the head of kings and princes.

4. To be a good house-keeper both in the country and city.

5. The fifth is, to be an induftrious and fortunate merchant..

6. To be a Philofopher, Mathematician, and Phyfician, according to Ariftotle, Plato, Ptolemy, Euclides, Hippocrates, and Galen.

7. To be a divine according to the bible and schools, which all writers of divinity both old and new have taught.

APHOR. XXV.

We have already declared what a fecret is, the kinds and fpecies thereof; it remaineth now to fhew how we may attain to know thofe things which we defire.

The true and only way to all fecrets, is to have recourfe unto God the author of all good; and as Chrift teacheth, "In the first place feek ye

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the kingdom of God and his righte ousness, and all these things fhall be added unto you."

2. Alfo fee that your hearts be not burthened with furfeiting and drunk. ennefs, and the cares of this life.

3. Alfo commit your cares unto the Lord, and he will do it.

4. Alfo I the Lord thy God do teach thee, what things are profitable for thee, and do guide thee in the way wherein thou walkeft.

5. And I will give thee understanding, and will teach thee in the way wherein thou fhalt go, and I will guide thee with mine eye.

6. Alfo if you which are evil, know how to give good things to your chil dren, how much more fhall your father which is in heaven give his holy fpirit to them that ask him?

7. If you do the will of my father which is in heaven, ye are truly my difciples, and we will come unto you, and make our abode with you. (To be Continued.) 200

CURIOUS NARRATIVE.

A MAN TRACING OUT MURDERERS ving true, or being ill reported, I should

BY THEIR FOOTSTEPS.

In a Letter to the Editor.

INCREDULITY in matters of fact is a piece of prudence, when they are related by anonymous authors, who chiefly aim at the fale of their books, or gaining the admiration of the vulgar by furprising ftories: but how aftonishing foever a relation may be, if it be confirmed by feveral hands, and efpecially by learned men and eyewitneffes, we ought rather to confefs our ignorance, or at least fufpend our judgment, than to reject it upon a pretended impoffibility.

I heard fome months ago of a murder difcovered in France by a divining wand; however I did not then take notice of it, left the thing not pre

expofe both philofophy and the phi-
lofopher to derifion: but having fince
learned all the circumftances of that
prodigious discovery, not by hearsay,
but as they have been inquired into
and fet down by perfons who cannot
be fufpected of credulity, as the French
king's Attorney, the Lieutenant Cri-
minal and other magiftrates of Lyons,
and the College of Phyficians of the
fame city, by the order and fpecial di-
rections of M. D'Aquin, first physician
to that monarch; fo great and fo ma-
ny teftimonies, not leaving any room
for doubt or fufpenfion, I applied my-
felf wholly to find out the cause of that
wonderful phænomenon, wherein I
think to have been fo
very fuccefsful,
that the fuppofitions I make contain
nothing but what is agreeable to the
true notions of natural philofophy.
Q a 2

I muft

410

A fingular Man.

I must needs premife a fhort hittorical account of the whole matter: First, because it is neceflary to underftand my fyftem; and fecondly, because, though you may have heard of this hiftory, yet I am apt to think that it is in a very confufed manner, and with fuch circumstances as render the relation incredible. As for inftance, they afcribe the difcovery to the turning of the wand; whereas the principal caufe is the internal motion or dif turbance of the discoverer; this turning being but an outward fign and confequence of it.

On the 5th of July, 1692, three robbers of Toulon, in Provence, the one called Thomas, a feaman, the fecond, Andrew Pefe, a fencer, and the third, Jofeph Arnoul, a taylor, went to the houfe of a wine-cooper of Lyons, and under pretence of buying wine, brought both the merchant and his wife into the cellar, where they murdered them with a fickle, while they were drawing the wine into a large bottle. This done, they went up to a chamber, which ferved both for a fhop and lodging room to the murdered; broke open their trunk, and took away 130 crowns, 8 louis d'ors, and a filver girdle, and then made their efcape with out being perceived by any one.

f

A neighbour of the murdered, hearing that one James Aymar Ternay, of S. Veran, near S. Marcellin, in Dauphine, was noted for hunting out rob. bers and murderers by their footsteps, caufed him to come to Lyons, where this countryman, having promifed to find out the affaffinates, provided he begun his fearch at the place where the fact had been committed, was by the Lieutenant Criminal's and the King's Attorney's order, brought into the cellar; where he was no fooner entered, but he felt a ftrange commotion, his pulfe rifing as in a violent fever, and the wand he holds, when he ufes to fearch the fprings of fountains, or hidden boundaries and treafures, turning quickly in his hand, efpecially upon the place where the bodies of the

hufband and his wife were fallen
down.

Thence he went up to the fhop,
where the robbery had been commit-
ted, and fucceffivély into all the streets
and places through which the murde-
rers had paffed, till he went out of the
city by the bridge of the Rhone, being
accompanied with three men; that
were admiring fpectators of all his
doings.

Sometimes he was fenfible that there were two accomplices, and fometimes that there were three; but his doubts were foon cleared, when fill following his interior motions, he stopped at a gardener's houfe, where he affirmed that they had encompaffed a table, and handled a bottle, amongst two others upon which his wand turned.

Two boys, who at first denied it out of fear of being beaten for having left the door open against their father's orders, at laft confefled that three men, whom they defcribed, had crept into the houfe and drunk the wine of the fame bottle which our countryman fhewed.

Purfuing his fearch, he went to the water-fide, where the fteps of the as. faffinates printed on the fand, were a certain fign that they had taken boat. He likewife followed them on the river, and pointed at an arch of the bridge of Vienne, which is not the ufual paffage; whence he inferred, that they had no waterman with them. During his journey, he caufed his boat to stop at all the landing places where the murderers had been on thore, went directly to the lodgings they took, fhewed the beds they lay in, the table they fat at, and the pots and glaffes they drank out of.

Thus he came to a French camp at Sablon, in Dauphine, where being mightily difturbed, he perfuaded himfelf he was in the prefence of the murderers, but not daring to make ufe of his wand to be convinced of it, left the foldiers fhould fall upon him, he returned to Lyons to beg a farther protection and affiftance; he was fent

back

T

C

The Murdering Sickle.

back to the campwith letters of recommendation; but before his coming, the murderers were gone to Beaucaire, in Languedoc, drawn thither by the fair, and the hope of a new booty. However he followed them fo far, going fiil to the places they had lodged at, and fhewing the beds, tables, and veffels they had made use of.

While he was walking in Beaucaire, he ftopped at the door of a prifon, affirming that there was one of the accomplices. Fourteen or fifteen prifoners were presented to him, among whom he marked out, by the motion of his wand, a crook-backed fellow, who an hour before had been taken for a fmall theft, and was thereupon farther fecured. Moreover he difco

vered that the other two had taken the ' road of Nifmes; but he could not purfue them, both because he fell fick of the many disturbances he had lain under, and that as the crooked fellow, who was that Jofeph Arnoul, the taylor beforementioned, denied at first to have any knowledge of the murder, and even ever to have been at Lyons; it was neceffary that Ternay fhould go back with his keepers, to confront him with his landlords. By which it fo plainly appeared that all what our countryman had formerly told was true, that the wretched taylor, not being able to deny it any longer, owned the whole fact before the judges, as it has been related, with this farther circumftance, that he kept the door, while his accomplices were murdering the man and his wife. Hereupon he was fentenced to be broken upon the wheel, and on his execution day, August 30, being made to país before the murdered's door, he confeffed of his own accord that he had been the principal caufe of that affaffinate by fuggesting the robbery.

Before his execution feveral experiments have been made, in the cellar, upon the prifoner, and upon the fickle,

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which was the inftrument of the murder. The wand is motionless in most people's hands, it commonly turns more or lefs quickly in the hands of thofe who have the gift of discovering fountains, and all these are inwardly agitated; fome faint away immediately, others feel the commotion an hour. after, and it is allayed by eating. Seven or eight perfons have been found by thefe experiments to be endowed with this virtue of discovering murders unknown to former ages. The murdering fickle has been put amongst others, and our peasant blindfolded; however as foon as he touched it, his pulfe rofe, he grew pale and fweat, and the wand turned with extraordinary quickness.

All thefe experiments have been made with the greatest caution imaginable, in the prefence of Mr. Panthot, Dean of the Phyficians at Lyons, Mr. Chauvin, another learned phyfician, the Licutenant Criminal, the King's Attorney, and feveral perfons of quality; fo that the magiftrate being fully fatisfied of the fincerity of the country. man, fent him in fearch of the two other murderers; he purfued them to Toulon, and the utmost havens of France, but all in vain, for they, having heard from the gaoler of Beaucaire of the taking up of the taylor, their accomplice, were embarked for Genoa.

At first fight this hiftory feems almoft incredible, though attefted by fo many eye-witnefles, but all the pretended impoffibility arifes from not well confidering the ftrong operation of infenfible corpufcles, and unheeded motion, of which there are innumerable inftances, as you may fee in moit of the writings of the modern philofophers, and especially in a book of the late Honourable Robert Boyle upon this matter, to which you may add, if you pleafe, the following obfervations.

(To be continued.)

ALBERTUS'S

ALBERTUS'S SECRETS OF NATURE.

(Continued from Page 382)

IT has been asked why fuperfluous aliment, which is converted into fperm in men, as well as into the menttrual fubftance in the other fex, fhould not have the periodical emiffion in the former, which it is known to have in the latter? The reafon affigned for it is, that women are by nature moift and cold, whereas men are hot and dry. The coldeft of men is of a warmer conftitution than the hottest of women, admitting the climate they live in, the food that nourishes them, and their digeftion to be alike, which circumftances are to be confidered, becaufe an Æthiopian female under the influence of a scorching air, affifted by luxurious diet, will undoubtedly be of a warmer conftitution, than a male inhabitant of a more temperate climate, accustomed to fatisfy the cravings of appetite with more homely fare.

On the other hand, an objection arifes to invalidate the foregoing obfervation; namely, that heat is great or lefs in proportion to the quantity of blood; now, that women are more fanguine than men is evident from the waste of that substance to which they are fiable; were it not fo the frequent confumption muft exhauft them; as fuch is not the cafe with men, it follows that their quantity of blood muft be proportionably lefs, and themselves confequently of colder natures. This argument has been answered by faying that where there is a greater quantity of blood well digefted and concocted, a greater degree of warmth was occafioned thereby; but, that this could with truth be afferted of women, was denied; therefore the reafons as alledged above were thought inconclufive.

That women have more blood than men is undeniable; hence it is that when, after impregnation, the off

flowing of fuperfluous aliment converted into blood, ceafes, a greater heat enfues, which makes them have a greater defire for coition; why the menftrual flow difcontinues as foon as a conception takes place, is a proof of the wife difpofition of all things by Providence; inafmuch as hereby a provifion is made, without which the fœtus would be deftitute of nourish

ment.

Previous to an enquiry into the formation of the foetus, it will be proper to take notice of a doubt entertained by fome refpecting the fource of that mucilagenous fubitance, of which it is formed. It has been faid that all the members equally contributed thereto; and the proof adduced to support the opinion is the fimilarity obferved between parent and child. But accord. ing to fuch mode of reasoning, it would follow that a parent having any bodily defect muft tranfmit the fame to his children, a notion which common experience is fufficient to refute; for we fee children begotten by perfons who are blind, lame, or otherwife disfigured, come into the world without having any fuch imperfections entailed upon them.

It is

At the time of generation, the elementary parts concur from the four principal members in both the sexes, viz. the brain, beart, liver, the matrix in women, and testicles in men. fufficient that the conftituent parts proceed from thefe, because they influ ence the other inembers; it is unqueftionable that the head muft contribute its proportion, fince it cannot have efcaped the obfervation of many, how fubject to pains in the head they are, who are much addicted to venery, as well as weakncis in the organs of fight, befides the debility that extends itself to other parts of the human frame, in confequence of the head being thus

affected.

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