the popular creed, and as such is
frequently noticed by the writers of Shakespeare's time. Thus, in
describing Prospero, Shakespeare has given him several of the adjuncts,
besides the costume, of the popular magician, much virtue being inherent
in his very garments. So Prospero, when addressing his daughter (i. 2),
says:

"Lend thy hand,
And pluck my magic garment from me.--So;
Lie there, my art."

A similar importance is assigned to his staff, for he tells Ferdinand
(i. 2):

"I can here disarm thee with this stick,
And make thy weapon drop."

And when he abjures the practice of magic, one of the requisites is "to
break his staff," and to (v. 1)

"Bury it certain fathoms in the earth."

The more immediate instruments of power were books, by means of which
spells were usually performed. Hence, in the old romances, the sorcerer
is always furnished with a book, by reading certain parts of which he is
enabled to summon to his aid what demons or spirits he has occasion to
employ. When he is deprived of his book his power ceases. Malone quotes,
in illustration of this notion, Caliban's words in "The Tempest" (iii.
2):

"Remember,
First to possess his books; for without them
He's but a sot, as I am, nor hath not
One spirit to command."

Prospero, too, declares (iii. 1):

"I'll to my book;
For yet, ere supper time, must I perform
Much business appertaining."

And on his relinquishing his art he says that:

"Deeper than did ever plummet sound
I'll drown my book."

Those who practise nocturnal sorcery are styled, in "Troilus and
Cressida" (iv. 2), "venomous wights."

_Merlin's Prophecies._ In Shakespeare's day there was an extensive
belief in strange and absurd prophecies, which were eagerly caught up
and repeated by one person to another. This form of superstition is
alluded to in "1 Henry IV." (iii. 1), where, after Owen Glendower has
been descanting on the "omens and portents dire" which heralded his
nativity, and Hotspur's unbelieving and taunting replies to the
chieftain's assertions, the poet makes Hotspur, on Mortimer's saying,

"Fie, cousin Percy! how you cross my father!"

thus reply:

"I cannot choose: sometime he angers me,
With telling me of the moldwarp and the ant,
Of the dreamer Merlin and his prophecies;
And of a dragon and a finless fish