MAGIC 



3592 



MAGIC 



the medieval legend this was the final test of 

 his formulas and incantations, the summoning 

 of the spirits without whose aid he is powerless. 

 Among primitive peoples the belief is a vaguer 

 one in the ability of the enemy by proper 

 ceremonies to bewitch one to- death, to spoil 

 crops, to inflict dire disease. This power for 

 evil was known as sorcery (black magic, necro- 

 mancy) ; it was prohibited among the Jews 

 (Leviticus XX, 27), among the Romans and in 

 English law in the early nineteenth century. 



As civilized nations gained a wider acquaint- 

 ance with the operations of nature, magical 

 practices withdrew to take shelter in special 

 cults, in miscellaneous observances of a folk- 

 lore type, though never absent from the con- 

 sciousness of the humbler classes. That the 

 educated classes were exempt from such belief 

 is suggested by Cato's question, whether one 

 diviner could meet another and not laugh; the 

 absurdity of a ragged fortune teller advising 

 others how to gain wealth and accepting a 

 small fee for the advice was as obvious in Ro- 

 man days as in our own. Magic retains interest 

 for its historical importance as well as for the 

 light which it sheds upon survivals of belief and 

 the origin of customs from which the original 

 meaning has departed or become transformed. 



The deposits of magic in the history of 

 thought are many. It appears in the view that 

 learning is a secret and esoteric pursuit, a reve- 

 lation of mysteries. It surrounds itself with 

 symbols, strange devices, occult operations; it 

 demands years of devoted preparation. Such 

 occupation seems congenial to the Oriental 

 mind; and the prestige of the Orient imparts 

 a similar importance when transferred to the 

 Western world. This factor appears conspicu- 

 ously in the career of theosophy (which see), 

 a cult that was founded in New York in 1875 

 and transferred to Madras in 1879; it revived 

 the notion of "mahatmas," or adepts; it per- 

 formed miracles, such as the transfer of objects 

 through space without contact; and it con- 

 nected its doings with a mystic view of the 

 nature of being and reincarnation. Though its 

 leader was convicted of gross fraud, the move- 

 ment continued to thrive. A similar belief in 

 the possession of unusual powers is responsible 

 for the traditions in favor of second sight, for 

 some of the alleged powers of spiritualistic 

 mediums (see SPIRITUALISM), and more re- 

 motely for the bias in favor of telepathy (which 

 see). A more practical aspect of the belief ap- 

 pears in the pretension of rain makers and in 

 other wonder-working practices. 



Unquestionably the belief in witchcraft in 

 some form is the largest product of magic. 

 Apart from the specific belief in witches (in 

 Christian lands ; see WITCHCRAFT) , and the gen- 

 eral primitive belief in the power of thus in- 

 flicting injury by wish and incantation and 

 ceremony (see SUPERSTITION), there is to be 

 included the types "of magical cures, treatment 

 by sympathetic magic, the use of fetishes and 

 allied procedures. 



Throughout this group runs the magical no- 

 tion that operation upon something that repre- 

 sents an object will affect the object. The 

 magical idea appears in the Melanesian prac- 

 tice when finding an arrow to place it among 

 cool, moist leaves if it is an arrow that has 

 wounded a friend, but in the hot embers if it 

 is an arrow that has wounded an enemy; in 

 the former case the wound will heal; in the 

 latter case it will be inflamed. Driving nails 

 in a man's footprint will make him go lame, 

 and even the utterance of names will serve 

 (such is the origin of the curse) to carry the 

 disaster to the owner. The converse process 

 underlies cures, the process of which may vary 

 from the treatment of the weapon that made 

 the wound to the exorcism of spirits that 

 caused disease. The fetish is an object to 

 which special significance is attached and which 

 serves to protect from such magical injury as 

 well as to cure by its peculiar power. Material 

 aids may be used, such as the medieval love 

 philters which would compel attraction, while 

 the special pursuits of alchemy and customs 

 associated with it form systematic examples of 

 magical procedure. 



Magic when viewed in its relation to religion 

 reflects the conception of the spirit forces from 

 which the power was derived, and from this 

 aspect develops its relation to ghosts, its no- 

 tions of bewitchment, exorcism and certain 

 phases of divination. In its relation to science 

 it develops the more complex systems of divi- 

 nation by the penetration of the secrets of signs 

 of things; it develops practices of cure and con- 

 trol through insight into hidden forces and an 

 influence upon their operation. In this pur- 

 suit appear the use of symbol and correspond- 

 ence, of the relations of one world (the celes- 

 tial) with another (the terrestrial) and a third 

 (the spiritual), which constitutes the course of 

 its inquiry. Its aim tends to ambitious and 

 comprehensive projects like the "philosopher's 

 stone." While in our own day the objective 

 view of natural phenomena prevails, tendencies 

 to belief in supernatural powers persist, though 



