"Black art" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... for advice and support to a sage volume entitled The Complete British Family Housewife, which she would sit consulting, with her elbows on the table and her temples on her hands, like some perplexed enchantress poring over the Black Art. This, principally because the Complete British Housewife, however sound a Briton at heart, was by no means an expert Briton at expressing herself with clearness in the British tongue, and sometimes might have issued her directions to equal purpose in the Kamskatchan ...
— Our Mutual Friend • Charles Dickens
... think of the cool ingenuity and readiness with which Mr. H——built up his airy fabric on my credulity, I am half inclined to laugh; though I feel not slightly irritated at having been the unresisting victim of his Black Art. ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various
... was laid in Thessaly, the original land of witchcraft, and took one up and down its mountains, and into its old weird towns, haunts of magic and [58] incantation, where all the more genuine appliances of the black art, left behind her by Medea when she fled through that country, were still in use. In the city of Hypata, indeed, nothing seemed to be its true self—"You might think that through the murmuring of some cadaverous spell, all things had been changed into forms not their ...
— Marius the Epicurean, Volume One • Walter Horatio Pater
... tale hath a particular bearing to other and more terrific days—"the olden time," so fruitful in marvels and extravagances—the very poetry of the black art; when Satan communed visibly and audibly with the children of men—thanks to the invokers of relics and the tellers of beads—and was so familiar and reasonable withal, as to argue and persuade ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 2 (of 2) • John Roby
... his moustache. "Just told it—and there you are. Is that a miracle, or is it black art, or what is it? And what do you think's the matter with me? That's what I want ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... scarcely credit the sort of things these people will write," he said. "It is all fiction and something called Black Art." ...
— Tales of Wonder Every Child Should Know • Various
... Oriental prince. Finding that by no feminine devices could she procure the influence she coveted over her master's mind and affections, she finally had recourse to an old and infamous sorcerer, styled Khoon Hate-nah ("Lord of Future Events"), an adept of the black art much consulted by women of rank from all parts of the country; and he, in consideration of an extraordinary fee, prepared for her a variety of charms, incantations, philters, to be administered to the prince, in whose food daily, for years, she mixed the abominable ...
— The English Governess At The Siamese Court • Anna Harriette Leonowens
... utility of the subjects within Scotland.' When the old gentleman came to the passage, which you will mark in italics, he always clenched his fist, and exclaimed, 'Nemo me impune lacessit!' which, I presume, are words belonging to the black art, since there is no one in the Modern Athens conjuror enough to understand their meaning, or at least to comprehend the spirit of the sentiment which my ...
— Political Pamphlets • George Saintsbury
... brother, sly John Doughty, sought To fan the seamen's fear of the unknown world With whispers and conjectures; and, at night, He brought old books of Greek and Hebrew down Into the foc'sle, claiming by their aid A knowledge of Black Art, and power to tell The future, which he dreadfully displayed There in the flickering light of the oily lamp, Bending above their huge and swarthy palms And tracing them to many a grisly doom. So many a night and day westward ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... will admit of any adventitious aid, it may perhaps be, in a very subordinate degree, mezzotint and aquatint. But etching rather improves Prince Rupert's invention than is advantaged by it. The sootiness of mezzotint is dangerous—in bad hands it is the "black art" of Prince Rupert, though the term was applied to a metal of the prince's invention, not to ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Vol. 56, No. 346, August, 1844 • Various
... on top of another it does not seem so difficult, although if we tried to do it we should not find it so easy as we think. Anyhow, let me give you a hint. If you want to make a good impression on a chemist don't tell him that he seems to you a sort of magician, master of a black art, and all that nonsense. The chemist has been trying for three hundred years to live down the reputation of being inspired of the devil and it makes him mad to have his past thrown up at him in this fashion. If his tactless admirers would stop ...
— Creative Chemistry - Descriptive of Recent Achievements in the Chemical Industries • Edwin E. Slosson
... money, remained entirely convinced that it was playing in an honorable and respectable private house, and very naturally spread abroad the fame of it throughout the whole city. But when the fat pigeon at last appeared, the band put forth all its forces, all the wiles of the black art, and in a few hours made up for the generous losses of a month of honorable and irreproachable play on the ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... on: "Moreover, in addition to my attainments in the black art, I am quite as clever as Mr. Sherlock Holmes in some respects. I really do some splendid deducing. In the first place, you were asked there and I was not. Why? Because I was to ...
— The Hollow of Her Hand • George Barr McCutcheon
... Majesty must not believe what is written. It is fiction, and something that they call the black art." ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 2 • Charles Dudley Warner
... cunning-men, and astrologers to know their fortune, or, as it is vulgarly expressed, to have their fortunes told them, their nativities calculated, and the like; and this folly presently made the town swarm with a wicked generation of pretenders to magic, to the black art, as they called it, and I know not what; nay, to a thousand worse dealings with the devil than they were really guilty of. And this trade grew so open and so generally practised that it became common to have signs and ...
— A Journal of the Plague Year • Daniel Defoe
... 'what new turns are here! Well, sir, I shall tell my lady of the METAMORPHOSES that have taken place, though by what magic (as I have not the honour to deal in the black art) I can't guess. But, since it seems annoying and inopportune, I shall take my FINALE, and shall thus have a verbal P.P.C.—as you are leaving town, it seems, for Buxton so early in the morning. My Lord Colambre, if I see rightly into a millstone, as I hope and believe I do on ...
— The Absentee • Maria Edgeworth
... and other slight-of-hand work. Well, the very moment I put my neb within the door, I was visibly convinced of the smell of burnt roset, with which I understand they make lightning, and knew, as well as maybe, what they had been trafficking about with their black art; but, nevertheless, having a stout heart, I determined to sit still, and see what they would make of it, knowing well enough, that, as long as I had the Psalm-book in my pocket, they would be gay and clever to throw any of ...
— The Life of Mansie Wauch - Tailor in Dalkeith, written by himself • David Macbeth Moir
... round for a support the last few days. Her first impulse was to clap her hands with delight and exclaim: "How, in the name of wonder, could he do it all in a night! Oh, Malcom, you are a canny Scotchman, but you put the 'black art' to very white uses." ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... the fact that for the most part he assumes that the facts of mediumship are somehow, and necessarily, in opposition to somebody's religion. He finds it sustained (or opposed) by the Bible, or he fancies it mixed with deviltry or the black art. He trembles for fear it will affect the scheme of redemption or assist some theosophical system. Whereas, a man like Bottazzi is engaged merely with the facts; he lets the inferences fall where they may. He is not concerned with ...
— The Shadow World • Hamlin Garland
... glimpse of His bright face; When on some gilded cloud or flower My gazing soul would dwell an hour, And in those weaker glories spy Some shadows of eternity; Before I taught my tongue to wound My Conscience with a sinful sound, Or had the black art to dispense A several sin to every sense; But felt through all this fleshly dress Bright ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 1 (of 4) • Various
... not only scotched, but killed. When it is merely stupefied or lulled to sleep it awakes again and the disciple uses his knowledge and his power for his own ends, and is a pupil of the many masters of the black art, for the road to destruction is very broad and easy, and the way can be found blindfold. That it is the way to destruction is evident, for when a man begins to live for self he narrows his horizon steadily till at last the fierce driving inwards leaves him but the space of ...
— Light On The Path and Through the Gates of Gold • Mabel Collins
... professor of Phoenixsistography, and other branches of the black art, the names of which are as mysterious ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari. Vol. 1, July 31, 1841 • Various
... his facts. Paracelsus employed nature in the quest of the supernatural or magical; this is shown by the poem, though in it he begins by repudiating, with all other external aids, the help of the black art. He therefore relied on other kinds of knowledge than that which springs direct from the human mind. The inconsistency however disappears in Mr. Browning's conception of the case, and the metaphysical language which he imputes to Paracelsus in the earlier stages ...
— A Handbook to the Works of Browning (6th ed.) • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... was neither a theatrical pose nor a passing folly excited by the fashionable craze for psychical research, but a genuine and enduring interest, inherited, it may be, from his ancestor, the learned, eccentric savant, Dr. Bulwer, who studied the Black Art and dabbled in astrology and palmistry. He was a member of the society of Rosicrucians, and, to quote the words of his grandson, "he certainly did not study magic for the sake of writing about it, still less did he write about ...
— The Tale of Terror • Edith Birkhead
... Red, ula, was the favorite color of Kapo. The kahuna anaana, high priests of sorcery, of the black art, and of murder, to whom Kapo was at times procuress, made themselves known as such by the display of a red flag and the wearing of a ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson
... Violet Mauling at the cigar stand. And all the long night and all the long day, the genii, working on the Harvey job, cast spells, put on charms, and did their deepest sorcery to take off the power of the magic runes that young Tom's black art were putting upon her; and day after day the genii felt their highest potencies fail. So no wonder they mumbled and grumbled as they bent over their chores. For a time, the genii had tried to work on Tom Van Dorn's heart after he dropped Lizzie Coulter and sent ...
— In the Heart of a Fool • William Allen White
... Jingler?—By my sceptre and crown, the man stares as if he took his native prince for a warlock! us that are the very malleus maleficarum, the contunding and contriturating hammer of all witches, sorcerers, magicians, and the like; he thinks we are taking a touch of the black art outsells!—But gang thy way, honest Geordie; thou art a good plain man, but nane of the seven sages of Greece; gang thy way, and mind the soothfast word which you spoke, small time syne, that there is one in this land that ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... the head, and his troopers in complete armour on either side, their heads resting on the table. Their horses, saddled and bridled, stand behind their masters in stalls on either side. The Earl was a leader of the Irish; he was very skilful at weapons, and deep in the black art. He could change himself into any shape he pleased. His lady was always begging him to let her see him in some strange shape; but he always put her off, for he told her that if during his transformation she showed the least fright he ...
— The Science of Fairy Tales - An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology • Edwin Sidney Hartland
... anew the Pope-wrought perfidy, That made an empire's plighted faith a lie, And fix'd a broad stare on the Devil's eye— (Pleas'd with the guilt, yet envy-stung at heart 15 To stand outmaster'd in his own black art!) Yet Milner— ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Vol I and II • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... Salisbury into marrying him while her lord was beyond seas, of poisoning my Lord of Pembroke, Sir Fulk de Breaut, and my sometime Lord of Canterbury's Grace. He might have spent his life in poisoning every body! Then, lastly, they said he had obtained favour of the Lord King by help of the black art." ...
— Earl Hubert's Daughter - The Polishing of the Pearl - A Tale of the 13th Century • Emily Sarah Holt
... sooner or later." Ku dragged it into the house, and said, "Let us wait till to-morrow to talk it over; we shall then be more calm." Next day the young lady arrived, and Ku inquired about her knowledge of the black art; but she told Ku not to trouble himself about such affairs, and to keep it secret or it might be prejudicial to his happiness. Ku then entreated her to consent to their union, to which she replied that she had already been as it were a daughter-in-law to his mother, and ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... displayed more benevolence of heart than soundness of judgment. As to the charge, still believed, of their giving the King drugs to injure his faculties, it is too absurd to be refuted. Their oppressors had better have accused them of dabbling in the black art, for the potent spell still ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... growing suddenly grave. "That is a charm takes more black art than I am mistress of. I know indeed of but one remedy. Is ...
— Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard • Eleanor Farjeon
... taught my tongue to wound My conscience with a sinful sound, Or had the black art to dispense A several sin to ...
— An English Grammar • W. M. Baskervill and J. W. Sewell
... into the councils of his foes. In fact, the power of the upstart marquis appeared so firmly rooted, the career before him so splendid, that there were not wanted whisperers who, in addition to his other crimes, ascribed to Roderigo Calderon the assistance of the black art. But the black art in which that subtle courtier was a proficient is one that dispenses with necromancy. It was the art of devoting the highest intellect to the most selfish purposes—an art that thrives tolerably well for a ...
— Calderon The Courtier - A Tale • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... she required to work her spells, and which she called Warlocks; but such women were not to be found. Thereupon a search was made throughout the house, to see whether anyone knew this [incantation]. Then says Gudrid, Thorbiorn's daughter: "Although I am neither skilled in the black art nor a sibyl, yet my foster-mother, Halldis, taught me in Iceland that spell-song, which she called Warlocks." Thorbiorg answered: "Then art thou wise in season!" Gudrid replies; "This is an incantation and ceremony of such a kind that I do not mean to lend ...
— The True Story Book • Andrew Lang
... actors in them were so certain, that many witches were led to the stake, their guilt being principally established on their own confessions. But the most memorable matters in the history of the black art, were the contracts which those who practised it not unfrequently entered into with the devil, that he should assist them by his supernatural power for ten or twenty years, and, in consideration of this aid, they ...
— Thoughts on Man - His Nature, Productions and Discoveries, Interspersed with - Some Particulars Respecting the Author • William Godwin
... Clergy was pleased to call Sacred. Men had an entire Confidence in the Pope's Power; his blessing of Swords, Armours, Colours and Standards; and No body doubted of the Influence, which Saints and Angels had upon Earth, the miraculous Virtue of Relicks, the Reality of Witches and Enchantments, the Black Art, or that Men might ...
— An Enquiry into the Origin of Honour, and the Usefulness of Christianity in War • Bernard Mandeville
... TO DO THE BLACK ART.—Containing a complete description of the mysteries of Magic and Sleight of Hand, together with many wonderful experiments. ...
— The Bradys Beyond Their Depth - The Great Swamp Mystery • Anonymous
... I was persuaded to let her try her black art upon my future. I shall never forget the strange, wild look of the wrinkled hag as she took my hand and studied its lines and fixed her wicked old eyes on my young countenance. After this examination she shook her head and muttered some words, which as nearly ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... be an adept in the "black art," an astrologer, or a fortune-teller, but I have no pretentions whatever to any such titles; this report has got abroad in consequence of a maid-servant having once had the temerity to peep through the key-hole, and observed on the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 529, January 14, 1832 • Various
... the exiles at the Burgundian court, who had also taught him the use of the longbow, building from architects and masons, painting from artists, and, more imaginatively, astrology from a wonderful flaming sphere in the sky, and the black art from a witch inspired by a long-tailed demon perched on her shoulder. No doubt "the young white king" made an exceedingly prominent figure in the discourse, but it was so quaint and so brilliant that it did not need the ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge
... auld, houlet-haunted biggin, Or kirk deserted by its riggin, It's ten to one ye'll find him snug in Some eldritch part, Wi' deils, they say, L—d save's! colleaguin' At some black art. ...
— The Complete Works of Robert Burns: Containing his Poems, Songs, and Correspondence. • Robert Burns and Allan Cunningham
... the skirt that the figure cut by the wearer might almost have passed for that of Mynheer Ten Broek of many-trowsered memory. But it was vastly more amusing to watch him than to play with him. He had a devil 'most undoubted.' Only with the help of black art and by mortgaging one's soul would it have been possible to accomplish some of the things which he accomplished. For the materials of croquet are so imperfect at best that chance is an influential element. I've seen tennis-players in the intervals of ...
— The Bibliotaph - and Other People • Leon H. Vincent
... the Babylonish priests spoken of by Daniel, and that of some others, who, to satisfy their irregular passions, pretended that their God required the company of certain women, proved that what is usually taken for the effect of the black art is only produced by the knavishness of priests, magicians, diviners, and all kinds of persons who impose on the simplicity and credulity of the people; I do not deny that the devil sometimes takes part in it, but ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... upon fairly good authority, that Pontiac belonged to the magicians of the Great Lakes. This has already been mentioned, but nothing has been said of how he practiced the black art. Much that was recorded has been lost, so some things can only be surmised. But his doings had a strong hold on all who came in contact with him, making his friends stick to him closer than ever, and causing many of his enemies ...
— On the Trail of Pontiac • Edward Stratemeyer
... descendant of the Moors who first landed at Algeziras, and from them had descended to her that knowledge of the black art which has been peculiar to that race. She, therefore, replied that although she could count on the resistance her almogavares, or garrison soldiers, would offer to the forces of the baron, still she would do her utmost to avoid a conflict. She then proceeded ...
— Tales from the Lands of Nuts and Grapes - Spanish and Portuguese Folklore • Charles Sellers and Others
... against shot, and stab, and flash! Hard frozen. Secured and warranted by the black art His body is impenetrable, ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller
... enlarged his medical attainments by joining in the incantations of the savage priests, who were universally acknowledged to be powerful enchanters, often performing seemingly miraculous cures by their skill in the black art. A large number—and many of these were persons of such sober sense and practical observation that their opinions would have been valuable in other matters—affirmed that Roger Chillingworth's aspect ...
— The Scarlet Letter • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... peaceful citizens for the occupation of marauders, and the enterprises of civilized life for the exaggerated romance of sea-rovers. Reading and writing, which were once looked upon by them as allied to the black art, are now the accomplishment of nearly all classes, and nowhere on the globe do we find people more cheerful, intelligent, frank, and hospitable than in the three ...
— Foot-prints of Travel - or, Journeyings in Many Lands • Maturin M. Ballou
... thirty-third year of the reign of his holiness Meramen-Ramses the Nile was late in its overflow. Earth-tillers, ascribing this misfortune to the black art of foreigners resident in the province of Hak, fell to wrecking the houses of Hittites, Jews, and Phoenicians, during which time a number of persons were slain by them. At command of his worthiness the nomarch, those guilty ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus
... enterprise on which they were both embarked—the betrayal of the city that gave them shelter. He could have understood—he had superstition enough—a moral distaste for alchemy and those practices of the black art which his mind connected with it. But this superiority of the scholar, this aloofness, not from the treachery, but from the handicraft, was beyond him. For that reason it imposed ...
— The Long Night • Stanley Weyman
... words certified the King that his Minister spake not except in envy end jealousy of Alaeddin, and would stablish in the royal mind that all this splendour was not made of man but by means of magic and with the aid of the Black Art. So Quoth he to him, "Suffice thee so much, O Wazir: thou hast none other word to speak and well I know what cause urgeth thee to say this say." Then Alaeddin preceded the Sultan till he conducted him to ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... joint, grocery stores, halls of dazzling delight, and dens of iniquity I made that night. I had my sketches and notes before me to continue this chapter, when I received a New York paper. In it I discovered an illustrated article headed "In His Own Black Art," purporting to be an account of my visit to the slums with a detective. After reading it I laid down my pen and took up my scissors, I felt it impossible to disclose any more. The rest I leave to my shadower on that occasion, reproducing also some of the sketches this "faithful ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol 2 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... their great Voltaire, and all their masters in this monument de grands hommes, imploring them to come down and succour them against the Aristocrats and the sword of Munchausen. Their cries were horrible, like the shrieks of witches and enchanters versed in magic and the black art, while the thunder growled, and storms shook the battlements, and Rousseau, Voltaire, and Beelzebub appeared, three horrible spectres; one all meagre, mere skin and bone, and cadaverous, seemed death, that hideous skeleton; it was Voltaire, ...
— The Surprising Adventures of Baron Munchausen • Rudolph Erich Raspe
... eldest son, the heir to the earldom, lay under a similar suspicion; for not a few of the household were far from satisfied that lord Herbert's known occupations in the Yellow Tower were not principally ostensible, and that he and his man had nothing to do with the black art, or some other of the many regions of occult science in which the ambition after unlawful power ...
— St. George and St. Michael • George MacDonald
... the chief philosophers of the dark ages, and between whom and the natives of France and Italy, a great communication existed. Toledo, Seville and Salamanca, became the greatest schools of magic. At the latter city predilections on the black art from a consistent regard to the solemnity of the subject were delivered within the walls of a vast and gloomy cavern. The schoolmen taught that all knowledge might be obtained from the assistance of the fallen angels. They were skilled in the abstract sciences, in the knowledge ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... of men, there also is found the belief that the worst and most rapacious of the man-eaters are themselves human beings, who have been driven to temporarily assume the form of an animal, by the aid of the Black Art, in order to satisfy their overpowering lust for blood. This belief, which seeks to account for the extraordinary rapacity of an animal by tracing its origin to a human being, would seem to be based upon an extremely cynical appreciation ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford
... to the wall Of those who wish and work its fall, With deeper skill in War's black art, Than Othman's sons, and high of heart As any Chief that ever stood Triumphant in the fields of blood; 100 From post to post, and deed to deed, Fast spurring on his reeking steed, Where sallying ranks the trench assail, And make the foremost Moslem quail; Or ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... haunted before the advent of the H—— family. Yet he is a Highlander, and not without superstition; for he gave it as his opinion that if there was anything in these noises, they must be due to Black Art. Asked what Black Art might be, he said he could not tell, but he had often heard about it, and had been told that when once set going it would go on without the assistance of its authors. He was quite clear, however that if ...
— The Alleged Haunting of B—— House • Various
... art of writing was a rarity in those days in the class among whom she lived. La Corriveau's ability to write at all was a circumstance as remarkable to her illiterate neighbors as the possession of the black art which they ascribed to her, and not without a strong suspicion that it had ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... the Boris, that this was the way the genie would come out of the jar. But how, if he were unable to help her? And how could he help her when these others might have Heaven knew what resources of black art, art of all the colours of the Yaque spectrum, if it came to that? The slim-trunked trees flew past them, and the tender branches brushed their shoulders and hung out their flowers like lamps. Warm wind was in their faces, sweet, reverberant voices of the wood-things ...
— Romance Island • Zona Gale
... conceived such a scheme; but, alas! in this very imperfectly organised world of ours brilliant ideas are seldom realised, and in this case I was destined to be disappointed. Did the old woman's black art warn her of approaching danger, or was she simply actuated by a feeling of professional jealousy and considerations of professional etiquette? To this question I can give no positive answer, but certain ...
— Russia • Donald Mackenzie Wallace
... gaunt and grizzled person. Reports were various as to the nature of his fortunate speculation, one intimating that the ancient Peter had made the gold by alchemy; another, that he had conjured it out of people's pockets by the black art; and a third—still more unaccountable—that the devil had given him free access to the old provincial treasury. It was affirmed, however, that some secret impediment had debarred him from the enjoyment of his ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... personae!—the creator of fictions converted himself into a fictitious personage!—there seems some strange confusion here. It is as if the magic wand were waved over the magician himself—a thing not unheard of in the annals of the black art. But then the second magician should be manifestly more powerful than the first. The second poet should be capable of overlooking and controlling the spirit of the first; capable, at all events, of animating him with an eloquence ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various
... a sin and crime, that when the laws against it were repealed in 1736, Scotchmen in the highest stations of church and state remonstrated against the repeal as contrary to the law of God; and William Forbes, in his "Institutes of the Law of Scotland," calls witchcraft "that black art whereby strange and wonderful things are wrought by a power ...
— The Witchcraft Delusion In Colonial Connecticut (1647-1697) • John M. Taylor
... ceremonies, and practice of the black art, the Prophet had gone far. He was now regarded as invulnerable, and his person sacred. But that which gave point to his oracles, and authority to his imposture, was his Shawnee hatred of the pale face. To incite their growing jealousy ...
— The Land of the Miamis • Elmore Barce
... and never stopped till he came to the gate of the castle—over which there were placed two human shank-bones of great length, that were said to have sustained the body of the Baron of Balwearie—that prince of the black art, and the most cunning necromancer that ever drew a circle. The carriage stopped; and two servants, dressed in red doublets, (like garments of fire,) slashed with black, waited at the carriage door, with flambeaux in their ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland Volume 17 • Alexander Leighton
... I fear, if the demonstration of experience has not quieted them, the voice of reason never will. It cannot fail to remind us of the apprehensions of the popish clergy in former times, who decried the art of printing, then recently introduced, as a branch of the black art, which, if encouraged, must eventually demolish the social fabric, and introduce civil wars and discord into every country. Time, that test of truth, has shewn us how groundless their apprehensions were. Instead of injuring that ...
— The Infant System - For Developing the Intellectual and Moral Powers of all Children, - from One to Seven years of Age • Samuel Wilderspin
... little occasions the Italian had shown acts of kindness, and, on some more rare occasions, even of generosity, which had served to silence his calumniators, and by degrees he had established a very fair reputation—suspected, it is true, of being a little inclined to the Black Art, and of a strange inclination to starve Jackeymo and ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... son's birth, had been a subchaunter in Bristol Cathedral and had held the mastership in a local free school. We are told that he was fond of reading and music; that he made a collection of Roman coins, and believed in magic (or so he said), studying the black art in the pages of Cornelius Agrippa. With all the self-acquired culture and learning that raised him above his class (his father and grandfathers before him for more than a hundred years had been sextons to the church of St. Mary Redcliffe) he is described as a dissipated, 'rather brutal ...
— The Rowley Poems • Thomas Chatterton
... "to prove to me that you were not a witch, as well as a bewitcher, for, verily, I had begun to think that by some black art ye flew out of your window at will. Nay," he protested, as Janice, closing her book, rose, "call ye this fair treatment, Miss Meredith? Surely, if ye have no gratitude yourself, ye should at least remember what I am doing for your father and mother, and not seek to shun ...
— Janice Meredith • Paul Leicester Ford
... dwell a little on this point, for I wish you to leave this room with a very clear conviction that scientific investigation is not, as many people seem to suppose, some kind of modern black art. I say that you might easily gather this impression from the manner in which many persons speak of scientific inquiry, or talk about inductive and deductive philosophy, or the principles of the "Baconian philosophy." I do ...
— Lectures and Essays • T.H. Huxley
... deeply read As he that made the brazen head; Profoundly skill'd in the black art; 345 As ENGLISH MERLIN for his heart; But far more skilful in the spheres Than he was at the sieve and shears. He cou'd transform himself in colour As like the devil as a collier; 350 As like as hypocrites in show Are to true saints, or ...
— Hudibras • Samuel Butler
... long impunity nourished atrocious crimes; and licentiousness increased to such a pitch that a certain senator followed the example of Hilarinus, and was convicted of having almost articled by a regular contract one of his slaves to a teacher of the black art, to be instructed in his impious mysteries, though he escaped punishment by an enormous bribe, as common ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... us good service then, Master Potts," replied Nicholas. "But since you are so learned in the matter of witchcraft, resolve me, I pray you, how it is, that women are so much more addicted to the practice of the black art ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... the fine art of music what the engrossers are to the black art of law; it all filters through them without leaving any sediment; and so the music of the day passes through Miss Vere's mind, but none remains—to stain its ...
— Christie Johnstone • Charles Reade
... powers. His age was the age of witchcraft, and in no county was the belief in the magic power of the "evil eye" more prevalent than in Lancashire. Dr. Dee, however, disclaimed all dealings with "the black art" in his petition to the great "Solomon of the North," James I., which was couched in these words: "It has been affirmed that your majesty's suppliant was the conjurer belonging to the most honourable privy council ...
— Books Fatal to Their Authors • P. H. Ditchfield
... LADIES turn conjurers, and can impart The hidden mystery of the black art, Black artificial patches do betray; They more affect the works of night than day. The creature strives the Creator to disgrace, By patching that which is a perfect face: A little stain upon the purest dye Is both offensive to the heart and eye. Defile not then with spots that face of snow, Where ...
— Lucasta • Richard Lovelace
... her lover. In great dismay, the young woman shouted the name of her sweetheart, but all in vain, he came not to her. The sun had now risen, and, almost broken-hearted, she returned home and related the events of the previous night. She was advised to consult a man who was an adept in the black art. She did so, and the conjuror told her to go to the same place at the same time of the night one year and one day from the time that her lover had disappeared and that she should then and there see him. She was farther instructed how to act. The conjuror warned her from going into the ring, ...
— Welsh Folk-Lore - a Collection of the Folk-Tales and Legends of North Wales • Elias Owen
... Argument) was an Amazonian Enchantress, and poor Seignior Cassani (as we learn from the Persons represented) a Christian Conjuror (Mago Christiano). I must confess I am very much puzzled to find how an Amazon should be versed in the Black Art, or how a [good] Christian [for such is the part of the magician] should ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... volume entitled "Poems, with notes illustrative of traditions in Galloway and Ayrshire, by Joseph Train, Supervisor of Excise at Newton-Stewart." The sheet contained a ballad on an Ayrshire tradition, about a certain "Witch of Carrick," whose skill in the black art was, it seems, instrumental in the destruction {p.002} of one of the scattered vessels of the Spanish Armada. The ...
— Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Volume V (of 10) • John Gibson Lockhart
... right," said the Marshal heartily, "as results have shown. And doubtless there is no truth in the rumour that you still retain some proficiency in the Black Art." ...
— In Brief Authority • F. Anstey
... the men who used it must be wonderful enchanters like the demons. "This specially they wondered, that we could sail out of all sight of land and yet know well enough where we were, all which, said they, could not happen, without black art. Scarcely less was their wonder at the sight of lighted candles, as they had never before seen any light but that of fire, when I shewed them how to make candles from wax which before they had always thrown aside as worthless, they were still more amazed, ...
— Prince Henry the Navigator, the Hero of Portugal and of Modern Discovery, 1394-1460 A.D. • C. Raymond Beazley
... the mortal, and make the human being like unto himself, whether it be for good or evil. [Footnote: Cornelius Agrippa, of the noble race of Nettersheim, natural philosopher, jurist, physician, soldier, necromancer, and professor of the black art—in fine, learned in all natural and supernatural wisdom, closed his restless life at Grenoble, 1535. His principal work, from which the above is quoted (cap. xx.), is entitled De Occulta Philosophia. ...
— Sidonia The Sorceress V2 • William Mienhold
... am sure, by the pretty story now current concerning the earnest young subaltern and the Brigadier. The former was responsible for the training of an expert section, in no matter what particular black art; the latter called in person one morning to witness an experimental display. The apparatus was produced, the Brigadier inspected it delicately, and the section was fallen in, standing near by in an attitude of modest pride. From them the Brigadier ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, February 16, 1916 • Various
... resorting to Rome for the purposes of study were forbidden to remain there after they were twenty-one years of age. The force of this persecution fell practically upon the old religion, though nominally directed against the black art, for the primary function of paganism was to foretell future events in this world, and hence its connexion with divination and its ...
— History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume I (of 2) - Revised Edition • John William Draper
... knew of course that you would manage it!" he said, contentedly. "It seems black art to me. I had ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris
... with thy talk on heaven and hell and flowers which vomit blood. God's death! Heard ever man the like? If thou knowest not of what thou pratest, thou hast lied, and that deserves a beating. If thou dost know, thou hast the black art of magic,—an evil-doer, with familiars who tell thee things not to be known of earth; and that deserves ...
— Nicanor - Teller of Tales - A Story of Roman Britain • C. Bryson Taylor
... all moments, to defend himself from the vertige which possesses the personages of whom he is writing; like a certain historian of witchcraft, whom we have somewhere read of, who had so industriously studied his subject that a faith in the black art imperceptibly gained upon him. The narrative goes on to say, that the unfortunate historian of witchcraft attempted to practise the knowledge he had obtained, and was burned for a wizard. But there the analogy will certainly fail. M. Reybaud soon recovers from the visionary ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... in the poisoning of Janoo, who is bound hand and foot by her debt to the bunnia. Suddhoo is an old dotard; and whenever we meet mumbles my idiotic joke that the Sirkar rather patronizes the Black Art than otherwise. His son is well now; but Suddhoo is completely under the influence of the seal-cutter, by whose advice he regulates the affairs of his life. Janoo watches daily the money that she hoped to wheedle out of Suddhoo taken by the seal-cutter, and becomes daily ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling
... arrive at any clear comprehension of the matter, Science is not, as many would seem to suppose, a modification of the black art, suited to the tastes of the nineteenth century, and flourishing mainly in consequence of the ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley
... of the simplest religious faith. [6] The age of reason and of scientific experiment as a means of arriving at truth had not yet dawned, and would not do so for centuries to come. Monks and clerics, representing the one learned class, regarded this Moslem science as "black art," and in consequence Europe, centuries later, had slowly to rediscover the scientific knowledge which might have been had for the taking. Only the book science of Aristotle would the Church accept, and even this only after some ...
— THE HISTORY OF EDUCATION • ELLWOOD P. CUBBERLEY
... sorcerer who was attached to his train. His character is drawn in Luke's description, and in Paul's fiery exclamation. Each has three clauses, which fall 'like the beats of a hammer.' 'Sorcerer, false prophet, Jew,' make a climax of wickedness. That a Jew should descend to dabble in the black art of magic, and play tricks on the credulity of ignorant people by his knowledge of some simple secrets of chemistry; that he should pretend to prophetic gifts which in his heart he knew to be fraud, and should be recreant to his ancestral faith, proved him to deserve the penetrating ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: The Acts • Alexander Maclaren
... gilded Cloud or flowre My gazing soul would dwell an houre, And in those weaker glories spy Some shadows of eternity; Before I taught my tongue to wound My Conscience with a sinfule sound, Or had the black art to dispence A sev'rall sinne to ev'ry sence, But felt through all this fleshly dresse Bright shootes of everlastingnesse. O how I long to travell back, And tread again that ancient track! That I might once more reach that plaine, Where first I left my glorious ...
— Spare Hours • John Brown
... (History of East and West Looe) says of him: "About a century since the Rev. Richard Dodge was vicar of this parish of Talland, and was, by traditionary account, a very singular man. He had the reputation of being deeply skilled in the black art, and would raise ghosts, or send them into the Dead Sea, at the nod of his head. The common people, not only in his own parish, but throughout the neighbourhood, stood in the greatest awe of him, and to meet him on the highway at midnight produced the utmost horror; he was then driving about ...
— The Haunters & The Haunted - Ghost Stories And Tales Of The Supernatural • Various
... these and many other curiosities, too long to relate, without the aid of the black art; but by natural philosophy alone, if we may believe the tongues whose eyes saw it. By these experiments, he so gained the King's favour, his Majesty granted him a pension of 2000 guilders. He died in London, anno 1634, the sixtieth year of ...
— Notes & Queries,No. 31., Saturday, June 1, 1850 • Various
... thought that it was not old Lizzie, which, nevertheless, was as clear as the sun at noonday! but my poor daughter who brewed the storm;—for, beloved reader, what could it have profited her, even if she had known the black art? This, however, did not strike Dom. Consul, and Satan, by the permission of the all-righteous God, was presently to use us still worse; for just as we got to the Master's Dam, he came flying over us in the shape of a stork, and dropped a frog so exactly over ...
— The Amber Witch • Wilhelm Meinhold
... guess? Eh? It is not great wisdom nor the black art that has told me your secret. A friend wrote ...
— Grey Town - An Australian Story • Gerald Baldwin
... name, brings Cosmo Ruggieri hither?" asked the Bernardin. "What doth the wrinkled old dealer in the black art hope to learn from us? We are not given to alchemy, and the occult sciences; we practice no hidden mysteries; we brew no philtres; we compound no slow poisons; we vend no waxen images. What doth he here, I say! 'Tis a scandal in the rector to permit his presence. And what if he came ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... upon all known branches of human learning is boundless. When a lad is designed for the priesthood, he is, as if by a species of intuition, supposed to know more or less of everything—astronomy, fluxions, Hebrew, Arabic, and the black art, are subjects upon which he is frequently expected to dilate; and vanity scruples not, under the protection of their ignorance, to lead the erudite youth through what they believe to be the highest ...
— Going To Maynooth - Traits And Stories Of The Irish Peasantry, The Works of - William Carleton, Volume Three • William Carleton
... that?" said a burly member of the group, as he looked round with scowling face at his companions. "Yes; what was that?" they echoed, and then made a rush for the manipulator of the black box, which they evidently took for some instrument of the black art. The photographer stood serenely innocent, and winked at the zaptieh to give the proper explanation. He was equal to the occasion. "That," said he, "is an instrument for taking time by the sun." At this the box went the round, each one gazing intently into ...
— Across Asia on a Bicycle • Thomas Gaskell Allen and William Lewis Sachtleben
... Majesty cannot really believe all that is written! There are some inventions called the Black Art!' ...
— The Yellow Fairy Book • Leonora Blanche Alleyne Lang
... will be plain with you. You shall be lodged here with suitable means for your experiments until such time as your pretensions are justified—if they are. Should you prove yourself a wizard, a dabbler in the black art and a deceiver of the people, you shall be so punished that all men may know we share not in your guilt. Reflection hereupon may perchance quicken your understanding. Until you have news of importance for our ...
— Masters of the Guild • L. Lamprey
... chief's interest in the matter was due solely to that age-old alliance which exists between church and state. The local witch-doctor, knowing his own medicine better than any other knew it, was jealous of all other pretenders to accomplishments in the black art. He long had heard of the power of Bukawai, and feared lest, should he succeed in recovering Momaya's lost child, much of the tribal patronage and consequent fees would be diverted to the unclean one. As Mbonga received, as chief, a certain proportion of the witch-doctor's fees and could ...
— Jungle Tales of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... scandal, but when it relates to dark and dreadful practices—to the exercise of unearthly powers—could anything be more piquant? It explains, too, the singular influence the man has upon me. It is the undefinable in his art—black art. Seriously, dear, I quite tremble when he looks me full in the eyes with those unfathomable orbs of his, which I have already vainly attempted to describe to you. How dreadful if he has the power to make one ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Vol. II: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians • Ambrose Bierce
... obey. Let fate depress an all unequal scale, Let Clothe hold her distaff—I'll not fail! Yet one more word—this to thy private ear— The fables that thou dost of Christians hear Are fables only, coined, I know not why, Distorted are they seen in Decius' eye. They practice the black art,—so all men say. I sought to learn the laws that they obey, And to discover what the secret guilt The which to expiate their blood is spilt. Yet priests of Cybele dark rites pursue At Rome—untrammelled—this ...
— Polyuecte • Pierre Corneille
... the "manifestations." Desirous of being esteemed learned, he laid claim to a knowledge of astrology, and when the "witchcraft" was the town talk he gave out that he could develope the whole mystery. The consequence was that he was suspected of dealing in the black art, and was accused, tried, and narrowly ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 4 • Various
... evidence of her condition. In the presence of these Commissioners, of whom the Lord Blantyre was president, the young lady flatly accused one Janet Burns, her mother's still-room maid, of tormenting her with aid of the black art, and for witness showed her back and shoulders covered with wales, some blue and others freshly bleeding; and further, in the midst of their interrogatories cast herself into a trance, muttering and offering faint ...
— Two Sides of the Face - Midwinter Tales • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... my nerves out of tune, and plays on them with a horse-hair bow till he sets my teeth on edge.... You don't know what that is! There's someone here who's stronger than I! Someone with a searchlight who shines it at me, wherever I may be. Do they use the black art in this place? ...
— The Road to Damascus - A Trilogy • August Strindberg
... have been headed off, or burned, most of us would still be living in mud caves at the foot of the cliff on which stood the nobleman's castle; and kings would still be kings by divine decree, scientists—if there were any —workers in the black art, and every phenomenon we failed to understand, ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... magic we who feared nothing in heaven or earth or in the waters beneath Alvaro and I, old freebooters of the Spanish Main; but they others Luiz Fonseca, Jose Albuquerque, and Antonio Mendez brave men, but ignorant shipmen, they were fearful of the witch-doctor and his black art. ...
— A Rip Van Winkle Of The Kalahari - Seven Tales of South-West Africa • Frederick Cornell
... Devonshire parish was a distinguished student of the black art, and possessed a large collection of mysterious books and manuscripts. During his absence at church, one of his servants visited his study, and finding a large volume open on the desk, imprudently began to read it aloud. He had ...
— Notes and Queries, Issue No. 61, December 28, 1850 • Various
... magician had been a good deal shaken by his failures in his black art, she admitted that, as a clairvoyant, he might be more inspired. We therefore went, as he had directed us, to the neighbourhood of Clare Market, where he had prophesied that we should find a Temple adorned with the Three Balls of Gold, which the Lombards bore with ...
— HE • Andrew Lang
... burning beam, And blackly fill'd the light; His body seem'd, by some black art, To look at Wallace, heart to heart, ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 3, August, 1850. • Various
... lit. one who by magical power can commune with the dead (Gk. nekros, a corpse); hence a sorcerer. From confusion of the first syllable with that of the Lat. niger, black, the art of necromancy came to be called "the black art." ...
— Milton's Comus • John Milton
... raising money, according to the modes of lawyers and attorneys. It was quite indifferent to me how they got money, provided they did get it. By what art these gentlemen raised money, I never troubled myself to inquire; it might have been the black art, for any thing I know to the contrary. I know nothing of business. So I signed all the papers they brought to me; and I was mighty well pleased to find, that by so easy an expedient as writing 'T. C. H. Delacour,' I could command money at will. I signed, and signed, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth
... prisoner, whose chief offence in its eyes was less her career as a warrior than her position as a sorceress. The actual facts of her life were of secondary importance to them. Orleans, Rheims, even her attack upon Paris were nothing in comparison with the black art which they believed to be her inspiration. The guidance of Heaven which was not the guidance of the Church was to them a claim which meant only rebellion of the direst kind. They had longed to ...
— Jeanne d'Arc - Her Life And Death • Mrs.(Margaret) Oliphant
... famished; for the master that I served there being in debt, ran away, by which cause I lost my penny fee, and was obligated to beg my bread. At that time many worthy folk in the shire of Renfrew having suffered great molestation from witchcraft, divers malignant women, suspectit of that black art, were brought to judgment, and one of them being found guilty, was condemned to die. But no executioner being in the town, I was engaged, by the scriptural counsel of some honest men, who quoted to me the ...
— Ringan Gilhaize - or The Covenanters • John Galt
... win the affection of the person of the opposite sex whom you sincerely love. There is no black art about this, but merely psychological attraction, and by its use you can win the love of the person ...
— The Ladies Book of Useful Information - Compiled from many sources • Anonymous
... doubt therefore, that among other fancies he was engaged in re-making the brazen speaking head of Roger Bacon and Albertus. Many persons might have felt alarmed at the peculiarity of my situation, but being accustomed to mingle with eccentric characters, and having no fear from any pretensions of the black art, I was infinitely gratified by all ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 12, - Issue 342, November 22, 1828 • Various
... have been rather restless, I fancy, concerning young Edwin, his brother, whom he caused to be drowned; and people with unquiet conscience are usually very superstitious. At any rate, he made a bosom friend of Dunstan, after the latter took up the black art, and became greatly interested in magic, much to the sorrow of ...
— ZigZag Journeys in Northern Lands; - The Rhine to the Arctic • Hezekiah Butterworth
... magic. There is no element of the black art about it. In its best and highest form it is plain talk, sane talk—selling talk. Its results are in proportion to the merit of the subject advertised and the ability with which the ...
— The Clock that Had no Hands - And Nineteen Other Essays About Advertising • Herbert Kaufman
... that whereas most of his race can or will use only corrupted or quite frivolous versions of it, this statement set its real and rare self forth with the utmost purity, value, and completeness, in a degree "known to only a few of all the families of Egypt." As such a weighty bit of Black Art did Mr. Antrobus make its details into a book. As such he printed it. Doubtless he thought that a betrayed secret may lawfully be re-betrayed as fully ...
— The Square of Sevens - An Authoritative Method of Cartomancy with a Prefatory Note • E. Irenaeus Stevenson
... youngster, because he is too pretty. They neither of them seem to me to keep Christian company. The boy is ever staring at the moon, the stars, and the clouds, like a wizard watching for the hour when he shall mount his broomstick; the other old rogue certainly makes some use of the poor boy for his black art. My house stands too close to the river as it is, and that risk of ruin is bad enough without bringing down fire from heaven, or the love affairs of a countess. I have spoken. Do ...
— The Exiles • Honore de Balzac
... work in the presence of Fray Bartolome de Carranza, to whom he explained the meaning of this holocaust. No more was heard of Poza; yet it seems that Luis de Leon's curiosity as to the possibilities of astrology continued with but little abatement.[173] This half-belief in astrology as a kind of black art was widespread during the sixteenth century, and vestiges of this ingenuous credulity have survived in unexpected quarters till our own time. It was perhaps unwise of Luis de Leon thus to furnish his adversaries with ammunition which they might use against him; but could anything bespeak ...
— Fray Luis de Leon - A Biographical Fragment • James Fitzmaurice-Kelly
... unmathematically divided between the sequestrators and creditors, who (not being able to ballance the account where there appeare so many numbers, and much troubled at the sight of so many crosses and circles in the superstitious Algebra and that black art of Geometry) will, no doubt, determine once in their lives to become figure-casters, and so vote them all to be throwen into the fire, if some good body doe not reprieve them for pye-bottoms, for which purposes you ...
— A Budget of Paradoxes, Volume II (of II) • Augustus de Morgan
... found which in manners and customs are much the same with their ancestors who crossed the ocean. The horseshoe is still nailed above the door as a protection against the troublesome spook, and the black art is still practised. Rough in their manners, and plain in their appearance, they yet conceal under this exterior a warm hospitality, and the stranger will much sooner be turned away from the door of the "chivalry" ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 • Various
... surveyed the hostile army, he was seized with anxiety and terror. He inquired of Jehovah, but received no answer, neither by dreams, nor by the ephod, nor by prophets. In his extremity he was driven into the arms of a black art which he had formerly persecuted and sought to extirpate. By night and in disguise, with two companions, he sought out a woman at Endor who practiced the raising of the dead, and after reassuring her with regard to the mortal danger connected with the practice of ...
— Prolegomena to the History of Israel • Julius Wellhausen
... to be present at a soiree fantastique! I had read of the Rosicrucians, of Count Cagliostro, and of Doctor Dee. I had peeped into more than one curious treatise on Demonology, and I fancied there could be nothing in the world half so marvellous as that last surviving branch of the Black Art entitled the Science ...
— In the Days of My Youth • Amelia Ann Blandford Edwards
... enjoyment, and what were then designated "sprees." Our stock consisted of four hundred and twelve pounds, which we had drawn from our parents and guardians under the various pretences of paying fees and procuring books for the advancement of our knowledge in the sublime mysteries of that black art called Law. In addition to our pecuniary resources, we had also a fair assortment of wearing-apparel, and it was well for us that parental anxiety had provided most of us with a change of garments suitable to the various seasons. For a long ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, August 28, 1841 • Various
... so placed, or because the editor meant that they should be studied, next after the physics. And this, he concludes, is said to be the origin of the word metaphysic. This is not very satisfactory; and if the reader thinks so, he will perhaps, be glad to hear those who, having dealt longer in the black art, are more likely to be conjurors in it. Harris, who had given so many years of his life to the study of Aristotle, tells us, that "Metaphysics are properly conversant about primary and internal causes."[1] "Those things which are first to nature, are not first to man. Nature ...
— Lives of the English Poets - From Johnson to Kirke White, Designed as a Continuation of - Johnson's Lives • Henry Francis Cary
... the unreal, he refused to treat the latter supernaturally. That mystery which lesser minds found in the occult, he saw in nature all about him. He denied the existence of spirits, just as he urged the foolishness of the will-o'-the-wisps of former ages,—alchemy and the black art. In one sentence he destroyed the pretensions of palmistry. "You will see," he wrote, "great armies slaughtered in an hour's time, where in each individual the signs ...
— Thoughts on Art and Life • Leonardo da Vinci
... in the Falcon Yard," at Cambridge; and I have no doubt almost every village had at least by repute its wise woman who could, for a consideration, unravel all mysteries about stolen property, malicious injuries, and a host of things amenable to the black art often vulgarly called witchcraft, in the name of which perfectly innocent creatures had in a previous age got a ducking in a horse pond, ...
— Fragments of Two Centuries - Glimpses of Country Life when George III. was King • Alfred Kingston
... was still holding out against it on the scientific side; and, as to the theological side, it was the period when that great churchman, Dean Cockburn, was insulting geologists from the pulpit of York Minster, and the Rev. Mellor Brown denouncing geology as "a black art," "a forbidden province" and when, in America, Prof. Moses Stuart and others like him were belittling the work of ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... pythonic spirit; evidently outside the natural order, still more evidently not by the agency of God, and of a certainty through the secret workings of the "Old Boy" himself. It was called Necromancy, or the Black Art. It had attractions for the Jews and they yielded to some extent to the temptation of consulting the Python. For this reason Moses condemned the evil as an abomination. These are his words, taken ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... that the life of Albert Magnus had been written by Dr. Sighart. This Dominican, magnus in magia, major in philosophia, maximus in theologia, was distinguished alike for his knowledge of the black art and his great virtue, for austerity of regimen, and dislike of any form of society. For other details of this philosopher I must refer you to Sighart's excellent monograph and Mr. James Mew's work on The Black Art from which we learn that Albert ...
— War and the Weird • Forbes Phillips
... laughs less, and disports herself less; but she hides it well and denies it stoutly if any ask what ails her. Her nurse, who had brought her up from infancy, was named Thessala, and was versed in the black art. She was called Thessala because she was born in Thessaly where sorceries are made, taught, and practised; for the women who are of that country make ...
— Cliges: A Romance • Chretien de Troyes
... the holy sacrament, or of the sweet beauty of God's world, clothed in the radiance of Good Friday; now it would reveal the sorrows of the gentle Herzeleide, or the awful anguish of Amfortas, or the deep rumblings of Klingsor's black art, or the fascinating music of the flower-maidens. Often came the pure tones that told of the guileless One, or the strong chords of mighty faith, or the ebb and swell of mystic bells, or the glory of the sacred ...
— Parsifal - A Drama by Wagner • Retold by Oliver Huckel |
