Ars Paulina (Lemegeton, Book Three)

The Ars Paulina, or Pauline Art, is the third book of the Lemegeton. It takes its name from the claim that the apostle Paul learned it after being caught up into the third heaven, as described in his second letter to the Corinthians. A medieval Latin Ars Paulina existed in the notory-art tradition, but the Lemegeton version is a distinct seventeenth-century compilation focused on angels. Its first part names the angels who rule each of the twenty-four hours of the day and night, together with their many subordinate dukes and servants, and gives their seals and the times for working with them. Its second part concerns the angels of the twelve signs of the zodiac and of each degree of the zodiac, so that every person, by the degree rising at his birth, has a particular governing angel who can be called on. The ritual equipment includes a table with a planetary seal and the use of a crystal stone for seeing the angel. The text also borrows talismanic seals connected with the pseudo-Paracelsian Archidoxis of Magic. Some passages draw on Trithemius and on Agrippa's tables of angelic names. The Ars Paulina thus belongs to the more theurgic side of the Lemegeton, seeking contact with good angels rather than the compulsion of demons, and illustrates how astrology, angelology and scrying were combined in early modern English practice.

What it contains

• Legend of Paul's ascent to the third heaven
• Angels of the twenty-four hours with their seals
• Subordinate dukes and servants of each hour angel
• Angels of the twelve zodiac signs and of each degree
• Discovery of the operator's genius from the natal degree
• Table, crystal stone and prayers for calling angels