e commanded, would the
effect resulting from it be miraculous or supernatural? No, without
doubt, supposing that the spirit which produced the result did nothing
that was above his natural powers and faculties.

But would it be a miracle if a man had anything to do with an angel or
a demon, and that he should make an explicit and implicit compact with
them, to oblige them on certain conditions, and with certain
ceremonies, to produce effects which would appear externally, and in
our minds, to be beyond the power of man? For instance, in the
operations of certain magicians who boast of having an explicit
compact with the devil, and who by this means raise tempests, or go
with extraordinary haste when they walk, or cause the death of
animals, and to men incurable maladies; or who enchant arms; or in
other operations, as in the use of the divining rod, and in certain
remedies against the maladies of men and horses, which having no
natural proportion to these maladies do not fail to cure them,
although those who use these remedies protest that they have never
thought of contracting any alliance with the devil.

To reply to this question, the difficulty always recurs to know if
there is between living and mortal man a proportion or natural
relation, which renders him capable of contracting an alliance with
the angel or the demon, by virtue of which these spirits obey him and
exert, under his empire over them, by virtue of the preceding compact,
a power which is natural to them; for if in all that there is nothing
beyond the ordinary force of nature, either on the side of man, or on
that of angels and demons, there is nothing miraculous in one or the
other; neither is there either in God's permitting secondary causes to
act according to their natural faculties, of which he is nevertheless
always the principle, and the absolute master, to limit, stop,
suspend, extend, or augment them, according to his good pleasure.

But as we know not, and it seems even impossible that we should know
by the light of reason, the nature and natural extent of the power of
angels, demons, and disembodied souls, it seems that it would be rash
to decide in this matter, as deriving consequences of causes by their
effects, or effects by causes. For instance, to say that souls,
demons, and angels have sometimes appeared to men--_then_ they have
naturally the faculty of returning and appearing, is a bold and rash
proposition. For it is very possible