On the Origin, Idea, Scope, and History of Ancient and Modern Magic

pain, fill his inner being, alternately illuminating or darkening it, carrying it up to heaven or pulling it down to hell?

We see the ultimate attempt to limit the power of the gods through secret magical forces, independent of nature and the gods themselves, actually carried out in the Heidenthum paganism of the Greek and Roman world of gods. Indeed, it is the characteristic of Zauberei sorcery among the Greeks and Romans, which gains such a boost for the imagination that Homer, Horace, Virgil, Ovid, Propertius, etc., could portray the sorceresses they praised—Medea, Circe, Canidia, etc. (the latter in Horace, Epodes V, XVII, XVIII)—as standing beyond the power of all gods, and, whether in earnest or in scorn, describe them as mistresses of the immortals, rulers over the stars and fate.

Without an exact historical-philosophical knowledge of the Greek and Roman world of gods, it is hardly comprehensible how such an idea could ever enter a human soul.

In Heidenthum paganism, however, Zauberei sorcery could develop in this sense and take this direction; indeed, at its highest level, it had to.

In Christenthum Christianity, this was impossible. In this, Zauberglaube magic-belief could not venture so far, even at its highest level, and had to develop along other forms, despite having the same tendency as the pagan one.

To properly illustrate the basic idea and final relation of Zauberglaube magic-belief—the mastery of nature and fate—according to the views of