§ 5.
Confirmation of the destructive pact with Satan

When the wretched, destructive pact outlined above between Satan and some Godforsaken individual has been formed and entered, the enemy of man and God wants to have it confirmed through witness, signature, and signs.

a. Through witness. To this end, Satan soon enough takes his new allies to the sorcerers’ gatherings and witches’ banquets wherever these are held so that the devil’s friends learn to recognize each other at all times. And thus Louis Gaufridy, after he had entered a pact with Satan, soon introduced himself in the large gatherings of the sorcerers, and brought with him the noble Madeleine Demandols de La Palud, whom he had led astray, to a large crowd of men and women who danced around a billy-goat, spoke to her to alleviate her initial shock, and assured her that everyone she saw was her good friend and that in their company she would be honored and respected.

b. Through signature, which the wretched people sign with their own blood and must give over to Satan. Thus did Johann Faust and the frequently mentioned Louis Gaufridy sign themselves over to the devil with their own blood, just like no less the poor day-laborer in 1642 in Esslingen in the Duchy of Württemberg, and because he could not write, Satan led his hand.

c. Through signs. Satan himself sets this sign on the body parts of those who have entered his pact. Rosset. Theatr. Trag. pm. 59 says that Satan marked Madeleine Demandols de La Palud, whom Louis Gaufridy brought to him, along with other sorcerers. The shape of this sorcerer’s sign should be like that of a rabbit’s or cat’s paw, like a toad’s hand, or a black dog, or just simple blackish or bluish marks.

These impressed and printed marks of Satan on the sorcerers and witches are said to be, it is written, totally insensitive, so that, even if one were to poke a needle deep into it, no blood would issue forth nor would there be any sensation of pain, according to Martinus DelRio disquis. Magiae.1.2.q.21. pag. m. 198. 199, who includes a number of varied examples.

§ 6.
Satan wants to be venerated in this pact.

It is known to all humanity, even those idolatrous heathen, from the light of nature, that there is one God, and He is the highest Good, the fountainhead and source of everything good.

In Holy Baptism and the celebration of the Eucharist, Christians oblige themselves to recognize this one true God as revealed in Holy Scripture and to all true believers: to serve Him alone and only according to His will as Creator, Savior, Protector, and Doer of Good Deeds, in upright holiness and righteousness for as long as they shall live, to trust in Him, and to seek their temporal and eternal welfare by none other than with Him alone: and to reject therefore Satan and all his works. This irks Satan and pains him terribly, for which reason he obscures among the heathen the natural recognition of God with sorcery, idolatry, and other vices, blinding them as outlined in 2 Corinthians 4:4 and drawing them away from the life that comes from God, Eph. 4:18. But he also draws Christians into all sorts of vices and attempts to wrench them from the covenant with God via sorcery as in Gal. 5:20 and convince them to pledge loyalty to him. In this way

a. he seeks to once again deceive man, whom he plunged into sin in the beginning but whom was saved from his control by the suffering and death of Christ. Athanas. de salutati adventu Christi.

b. He presents himself to the simple-minded as though he were a god and seeks to establish and maintain his kingdom; just as God establishes and maintains His.

α) Ages ago God spoke to his people through the prophets and revealed his will clearly and definitively to them. In the same way, the Prince of the World, the onerous devil, reveals his will to his subjects, sometimes in person, sometimes through his servants, the sorcerers.

ß) God propagates and maintains His kingdom through His Word, His Spirit, and the Sacrament. Satan uses similar methods for the propagation and maintenance of his kingdom.

aa. Satan uses many words, he promises a heap of gold, but it is all pure deception and trickery.

bb. The devil sends his spirits out, but they teach no truth but are deceptive, false, misleading spirits in the mouths of those whom the Lord, according to his righteousness has given over to the power of the devil. 2 Kings 22–23.

cc. The devil has his own sacrament, his baptism in his damned name, his characters and other symbols with which he marks those who belong to him; and thereby he desecrates and heaps contempt on God’s name in the hearts of these people more and more over time: and, given his vast knowledge of natural, historical, and spiritual things, and his great strength and power, and agile, quick cunning, he is able to increase his renown.

c. He attacks people of all estates to mislead them and make them sorcerers:

αα) Among the clergy: long ago, the false prophet Balaam: and in the age of our fathers and grandfathers, many different [individuals], examples of which can be found in Martino Delrio and Simone Majoli.

ßß) In the secular estate, it was through the seduction of the devil that Manasseh, a king of Judah, practiced sorcery. 2. Chron. 33:6. And Henry or Erik, a king in Sweden, was such close allies with the devil that according to how he set his hat on his head a pleasant breeze would flow in, for which reason he was called ventosus pileus, or Weather-Hat.

γγ) And among the common people [Hausstand, lit. households]: as we see in Holy Scripture in the example of the witch in Endor, 2 Sam. 28:8.[1] And, unfortunately, daily even now, women and men are sucked into these terrible vices; but more women than men, for the former are generally less cautious than the men and less able to resist the tendencies of their disposition and are more likely to be led to evil. Chrysostom. Homil. 44. in Matth. 23.