Note 87 — Chapter I

A sufficiently large collection from ancient and modern writers of the facts of inhuman connections may be seen in the Anatomy of Melancholy, part iii. sect. 2. Having repeated the assertions of previous authors proving the fact of intercourses of human with inferior species of animals, Burton fortifies his own opinion of their reality by numerous authorities. If those stories be true, he reasons, that are written of Incubus and Succubus, of nymphs, lascivious fauns, satyrs, and those heathen gods which were devils, those lascivious Telchines of whom the Platonists tell so many fables; or those familiar meetings in our day [1624] and company of witches and devils, there is some probability for it. I know that Biarmannus, Wierus, and some others stoutly deny it ... but Austin (lib. xv. de Civit. Dei) doth acknowledge it. And he refers to Plutarch, Vita Numæ; Wierus, de Præstigiis Dæmon., Giraldus Cambrensis, Malleus Malef., Jacobus Reussus, Godelman, Erastus, John Nider, Delrio, Lipsius, Bodin, Pererius, King James, &c. The learned and curious work of the melancholy Student of Christ Church and Oxford Rector has been deservedly commended by many eminent critics. That 'exact mathematician and curious calculator of nativities' calculated exactly, according to Anthony Wood (Athenæ Oxon.), the period of his own death—1639.