; or whether the soul determines simply by its will, as
occasional or secondary cause, the first cause, which is God, to put
in motion the machine which it once animated.

2d. If after death the soul still retains that power over its own
body, or over others; for instance, over the air and other elements.

3d. If angels and demons have respectively the same power over
sublunary bodies--for instance, to thicken air, inflame it, produce in
it clouds and storms; to make phantoms appear in it; to spoil or
preserve fruits and crops; to cause animals to perish, produce
maladies, excite tempests and shipwrecks at sea; or even to fascinate
the eyes and deceive the other senses.

4th. If they can do all these things naturally, and by their own
virtue, as often as they think proper; or if there must be a
particular order, or at least permission from God, for them to do what
we have just said.

5th. Lastly, we should know exactly what power is possessed by these
substances which we suppose to be purely spiritual, and how far the
power of the angels, demons, and souls separated from their gross
bodies, extends, in regard to the apparitions, operations and
movements attributed to them. For whilst we are ignorant of the power
which the Creator has given or left to disembodied souls, or to
demons, we can in no way define what is miraculous, or prescribe the
just bound to which may extend, or within which may be limited, the
natural operations of spirits, angels, and demons.

If we accord the demon the faculty of fascinating our eyes when it
pleases him, or of disposing the air so as to form the appearance of a
phantom, or phenomenon; or of restoring movement to a body which is
dead but not entirely corrupted; or of disturbing the living by ill
dreams, or terrific representations, we should no longer admire many
things which we admire at present, nor regard as miracles certain
cures and certain apparitions, if they are only the natural effects of
the power of souls, angels and demons.

If a man invested with his body produced such effects of himself, we
should say with reason that they are supernatural operations, because
they exceed the known ordinary and natural power of the living man;
but if a man held commerce with a spirit, an angel, or a demon, whom
by virtue of some compact, explicit or implicit, he commanded to
perform certain things which would be above his natural powers, but
not beyond the powers of the spirit whom h