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THE Goëtic Art of Solomon 1 gives instructions for the evocation of the seventy-two spirits whom the King of Israel, according to a well-known legend, shut up in a brass vessel and cast into a deep lake. When the vessel was discovered by the Babylonians, it was supposed to contain a great treasure and was accordingly broken open. The spirits who were thus set at liberty, together with their legions, returned to their former places, Belial excepted, who entered into a certain image, and gave oracles to the people of the country in return for sacrifices and divine honours, by which there is corrupt Kabalistic authority for concluding that demons were assuaged and sustained. Their names and offices are as follows:--
195:1 Though a work of considerable length, this Lesser Key, so far as it concerns our inquiry, admits of reduction into a manageable compass by the omission of tiresome and egregious particulars as to the number of spirits who are subject to a particular Lord, Prince or Emperors and are liable to appear in his company. It should be understood in a general way that there are hundreds and thousands and millions, according to the dignity of the hierarch; they must have been a source of considerable inconvenience, and even of dismay, to the operator!