Le Livre Secret Des Grands Exorcismes Et Bénédictions; Prières Antiques, Formules Occultes, Recettes Spéciales Avec Explication & Application Des Signes Et Pentacles,? Contenus Dans Les Grands Secrets Merveilleux, Les Prières Liturgiques, Le Livre Des Exorcismes Et Les Petits Secrets Merveilleux ; Recueil Rare Et Précieux Ne Devant ETre Confié Qu'aux Personnes Vertueuses, Douées Du Don De Faire Le Bien Et De Combattre Le Mal Sous Toutes Ses Formes
Paris: Henri Durville, 1920. Troisième Édition. Hardcover. Small octavo. 604pp (+ivpp adverts) Contemporary yellow pebbled cloth with red titling and pentagram design to rear cover. Black and white frontispiece and alphabetic table, 28 colour plates, mostly of talismans, three black and white photographs. An extraordinary and scarce work by Abbe Julio (Ernest Louis Houssay, 1844-1912) an ordained French monk who left the Roman Catholic church and became involved in various neo-Catholic groups, principally l'Église catholique gallicane and l'Église Catholique Libre de France, and was also well known in occult circles of the time. Houssay, who wrote under the name Abbe Julio, practiced as a healer and hypnotist, who combined Christian Gnostic formulas with occult, theosophical and spiritualist thought in his practices. While he was a great believer in prayer, and decried the dangers of ceremonial magic, he had a strong belief in magic seals and talisman as amongst the most efficacious of the occultist's tools. "Le Livre Secret Des Grands Exorcismes Et Bénédictions" was first published in 1908, and is a remarkable collection, in many ways reminiscent of the grimoires of the preceding century, in that it offers a large number of prayers, Psalms, exorcisms (all in Latin), and talismans and seals, designed to do everything from curing wounds, snake bites, ailments and diseases and misfortunes of all sorts, to solving crimes and preventing murder and offering protection from ghosts, spirits of darkness, incubbi, succubi, vampires, and other things that go bump in the night. This, the third edition of 1920, is perhaps the most handsome, with 28 color plates of pentragrams, and other magic seals. Covers a bit worn and grubby, short tears to cloth hinges at either side of bottom of spine, but boards still firmly attached. Pages evenly darkened with the occasional flecking and chips to the margins. Still a solid, tight better-than VG copy. Very scarce in any early edition. Item #43021
Sold