"Black magic" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... this power is very real, and like any other of the forces of nature may be properly used and applied in our every day life, still many students of the power of the Mind have misused it and have stooped to practices worthy only of the followers of the schools of "Black Magic." We hear on all sides of the use of "treatments" for selfish and often base ends, those following these practices seeming to be in utter ignorance of the occult laws brought into operation, and the terrible reaction inevitably falling to the lot of those practicing this ...
— A Series of Lessons in Raja Yoga • Yogi Ramacharaka
... press around the reel. Nothing was visible in the air, now, nothing but a thin piece of wire leading up into the sky. Had no one known that the kites were there, high above the clouds, it would have seemed like black magic. Some of the superstitious negroes ...
— The Boy with the U. S. Weather Men • Francis William Rolt-Wheeler
... man's ear? What sort of a wizard must he be, or ghoul, or madman? And in Salem, too, the home of the witchcraft superstition! Certainly it would not have gone well with Bell had he lived two centuries earlier and been caught at such black magic. ...
— The History of the Telephone • Herbert N. Casson
... him! A thousand reasons, gospodar," cried the man passionately; "he who has this book understands the black magic of Kensky and the Jews! By the mysteries in this book he is able to torment his enemies and bring sorrow to the Christians who oppose him. Did not the man Ivan Nickolovitch throw a stone at him, and did not Ivan drop dead the next day on his ...
— The Book of All-Power • Edgar Wallace
... the keynote of all the debased forms of Gnosticism. According to Eliphas Levi, certain of the Gnostics introduced into their rites that profanation of Christian mysteries which was to form the basis of black magic in the Middle Ages.[111] The glorification of evil, which plays so important a part in the modern revolutionary movement, constituted the creed of the Ophites, who worshipped the Serpent ([Greek: ophis]) because he had revolted ...
— Secret Societies And Subversive Movements • Nesta H. Webster
... as in soulless affairs. "Don't have anything to do with Madame Tingley," whispers a Theosophist lady to my Wife; and when my wife in all innocence inquires, "Why not?" the awe-stricken answer comes, "She practices black magic!" ...
— The Profits of Religion, Fifth Edition • Upton Sinclair
... for the name over the shop. Instead of being somebody or other, Florist, it was 'Doloro de Lara, Professor of white and black Magic,' and in the window was a large card, framed and ...
— Oswald Bastable and Others • Edith Nesbit
... works, many of which even at this early date were already old, prayers drawn up during the first dynasties, devout poetry belonging to times prior to the misty personage called Mini—hymns to the gods of light, formulas of black magic, collections of mystical works, such as the "Book of the Dead"* and the "Ritual of the Tomb;" scientific treatises on medicine, geometry, mathematics, and astronomy; manuals of practical morals; and lastly, romances, or those marvellous ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 2 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... contributing to amusement; of the latter was magic used to bring disease and death on men and animals or tempests upon the growing crops. Hence gradually arose a general distinction between white magic, which dealt openly with the more beneficent means of nature, and black magic, which dealt secretly with ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... of study and experiment for thousands of years. The informed Hindu, rightly or wrongly, regards the Western practice of hypnotism, both in its methods and in its results, with mingled horror and contempt. To him it is not different from Black Magic, pernicious to operator and subject alike, since it involves an unwarrantable tyranny of the will on the part of the operator, and a dangerous submission to the obsession of an invading will on the part of the subject. Eastern hypnotism—at ...
— Four-Dimensional Vistas • Claude Fayette Bragdon
... there would be a thunderstorm during the night, and every one knew that he never made a mistake about the weather. Nevertheless, Jack's mother watered the plants as if he had not spoken, for it seemed to her that this meteorological gift smacked a little of sorcery and black magic; but in spite of herself she felt sure that there would be a thunderstorm and that her labour was therefore vain, save perhaps as a protest against idle superstition. It was in the same spirit that she carried an umbrella on the ...
— The Ghost Ship • Richard Middleton
... shall abide. I know nothing of black magic, or any other. But I care not. I know only that I cannot accept this stranger as a spirit. I have felt his muscles, and I know his strength; they are a ...
— The Blind Spot • Austin Hall and Homer Eon Flint
... comparatively easy to learn the trick of spells and the methods of using the subtler, but still material, forces of physical nature; the powers of the animal soul in man are soon awakened; the forces which his love, his hate, his passion, can call into operation, are readily developed. But this is Black Magic—Sorcery. For it is the motive, and the motive alone, which makes any exercise of power become black, malignant, or white, beneficent Magic. It is impossible to employ spiritual forces if there is the slightest tinge of selfishness remaining in the operator. For, ...
— Studies in Occultism; A Series of Reprints from the Writings of H. P. Blavatsky • H. P. Blavatsky
... of this in what is called Black Magic—the wilful and intentional throwing of evil conditions on other people, making hard and cruel images of them in the mind, and so forth. But all that is as child's play to what would happen if the absolute clay were put into their ...
— Seen and Unseen • E. Katharine Bates
... The sacrifice of children has always been considered by popular superstition as an essential part in practices of black magic or ...
— Legends, Tales and Poems • Gustavo Adolfo Becquer
... secret incense of Ancient Egypt," whispered Dr. Cairn, glancing towards the open door; "it is the odour of that Black Magic which, by all natural law, should be buried and lost for ever in the tombs of the ancient wizards. Only two living men within my knowledge know the use and the hidden meaning of that perfume; only one living man has ever dared to make ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer
... herself that no one had sought those strange experiences less than she had, no one had been less interested in Spiritualism and black magic, as it used to be called, than she had been—and, indeed, still was. Michael had called her his practical mystic, yet she had never ...
— There was a King in Egypt • Norma Lorimer
... a brave man, I think, for the Stick was Magic to him, also, and yet he stood out against it. Black Magic he said it was, and no wonder it had not led them out of the Swamp, since it was a false stick and Taku-Wakin a Two-Talker. Taku-Wakin could no more lead them out of the Swamp than his stick would leave him. Like it, they would ...
— The Trail Book • Mary Austin et al
... '"Black Magic," said the Clerk of Netherfield (he had been a monk at Battle). "They say Rahere is more of a priest than a fool and more of a wizard than either. Here's Rahere's name writ, and there's Rahere's red cockscomb mark drawn below for such as cannot ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling
... the Middle Ages hovered over that improbable book, the Pretre marie; magic blended with religion, black magic with prayer and, more pitiless and savage than the Devil himself, the God of Original Sin incessantly tortured the innocent Calixte, His reprobate, as once He had caused one of his angels to mark the houses of unbelievers whom ...
— Against The Grain • Joris-Karl Huysmans
... engine of latter-day detective romance. He explained it to the horribly fascinated Litton, whose hair stood on end and whose voice stuck in his throat in the best Vergilian manner. Before he quite understood its black magic Litton suspected the infernal purpose it had been put to. His wrath had melted to a sickening fear when Teed reached the conclusion of his ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... perfect brute—all bone and no flesh—with a temper like the foul fiend and no points whatever—looked a regular crock at starting. But he romped home on three legs, notwithstanding, with his jockey clinging to him like an inspired monkey. It was the only race he ever won. Every one put it down to black magic or personal magnetism on the part of his rider. Same thing, I believe. He was the sort of chap who always comes out on top. Rum thing I can't remember his name. I had travelled out with him on the same boat once too. Have ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... endurance. The brain is reinforced in the sum-total of its reserved energy. When really chaste natures need to call on the resources of body or soul, and are required to act or to think, they have muscles of steel, or intuitive knowledge in their intelligence—diabolical strength, or the black magic ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... fragments of Egyptian philosophy that it found in the Encyclopaedia Britannica; annexed as many of the Vedas as had been translated into French or English, and talked of all the rest; built in the German versions of what is left of the Zend Avesta; encouraged white, gray, and black magic, including Spiritualism, palmistry, fortune-telling by cards, hot chestnuts, double-kerneled nuts and tallow droppings; would have adopted Voodoo and Oboe had it known anything about them, and showed itself, in every way, one of the most accommodating arrangements that had ever ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... Bukawai, the unclean, who dwelt in a cave in the hillside to the north, and who it was well known entertained devils in his evil lair. Few, if any, had the temerity to visit old Bukawai, firstly because of fear of his black magic and the two hyenas who dwelt with him and were commonly known to be devils masquerading, and secondly because of the loathsome disease which had caused Bukawai to be an outcast—a disease which was ...
— Jungle Tales of Tarzan • Edgar Rice Burroughs
... suppression of its nobler powers. In suppressing sympathy and sensibility, it impairs the foundation of our most amiable virtues, isolates man from the companionship and love of his fellow-beings and comes dangerously near to misanthropy and black magic, or the attempt to use spiritual powers and the spiritual realm for purely ...
— Buchanan's Journal of Man, January 1888 - Volume 1, Number 12 • Various
... one thing, it was held uncanny, in Polpier, to turn the soil by moonlight—a deed never done save by witches or persons in league with Satan. Albeit they may not own to it, two-thirds of the inhabitants of Polpier believe in black magic. ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)
... people looked almost like another race in contrast with their brothers and sisters of the comfortable classes. Another race! The race into which she would soon be reborn under the black magic of poverty! As she glanced and reflected on what she saw, viewed it in the light of her experience, her fingers slackened, and she could speed them up only ...
— Susan Lenox: Her Fall and Rise • David Graham Phillips
... will, is an inverted conception, which, though it may appear to succeed for a time, is bound to fail eventually, because it antagonizes the very power it is seeking to use. This inverted use of the Will is the basis of "Black Magic," a term some readers will perhaps smile at, but which is practised at the present day to a much greater extent than many of us have any idea of—not always, indeed, with a full consciousness of its nature, but in many ...
— The Law and the Word • Thomas Troward
... sorcery and of using black magic, he explained very simply that he had foreseen the danger, because in raising his eyes he had noticed that the part of the ground over which the herald had passed was sinking, and that he had drawn ...
— Common Sense - - Subtitle: How To Exercise It • Yoritomo-Tashi
... many savage peoples that they recognise no natural death, but believe that all deaths not due to violence are due to black magic. No such statement can be made of the Kayans; few, if any, deaths are ascribed by them to the efforts of sorcerers. Natural death is recognised as inevitable in old age, and disease is vaguely conceived as the effect of natural ...
— The Pagan Tribes of Borneo • Charles Hose and William McDougall
... are not run by electricity at all, but just pretend. They are run by three things—black magic, white magic and a sense of humor. Black magic takes them up the hills, white magic restrains them down, and the sense of humor is in the Irish conductors. You may hear, if you listen, the magic coming out of the ground, "Kibble-kable, kibble-kable," ...
— Vignettes of San Francisco • Almira Bailey
... Bart at length. "We saw them go in and we followed them up and they weren't there. Sounds like black magic, doesn't it?" ...
— Army Boys on German Soil • Homer Randall
... old soldier, by whimpering insistently, brought himself to Johnnie's attention. But the moment Grandpa was waited upon, back Johnnie went to his book, and page was turned upon page as the black magic of the hateful African wafted that most perfect of palaces many a league from its original site, and separated for his own wicked purposes the loving Aladdin and his devoted Buddir ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates
... Your black magic's all humbug. It lacks the essential attribute of fulfilment. It doesn't work. Black magic that doesn't ...
— Pearl of Pearl Island • John Oxenham
... by means of his black magic, saw her coming, and sent such a fierce wind to blow against her that it prevented the Stork from making any headway through the air. Therefore, in spite of his huge wings and remarkable strength, the brave bird was unable to get an inch nearer ...
— The Surprising Adventures of the Magical Monarch of Mo and His People • L. Frank Baum
... that the darksome shadows might flit and hover about us like vampires on the scent of blood. A cold perspiration induced by a nameless fear came upon me, and in that dark future to which my heated imagination travelled I saw, as if revealed by black magic, fair, sweet, generous Dorothy, standing piteously upon Bowling Green hillside. Over her drooping form there hung in air a monster cloudlike image of her father holding in its hand a deadly bludgeon. So black, so horrid was this shadow-demon that I sprang from ...
— Dorothy Vernon of Haddon Hall • Charles Major
... as you stood on the steps at the quay, or sat in the stern of the Annie Laurie, and my heart grew sick with longing for you, and I'd get up and leave the girl so suddenly that she used to stare after me with mingled surprise and indignation. What charm do you exert, what black magic, Nell, that a big, strong, hulking fellow like me cannot get free from the spell you throw over him? Tell ...
— Nell, of Shorne Mills - or, One Heart's Burden • Charles Garvice |
