12, 13.

For Descartes, see his De meteor., cent.
2, 127.

In his Historia Ventorum he again alludes to the belief, and without comment.
But no such moderate doctrine sufficed, and the renowned Bishop Binsfeld, of Treves, in his noted treatise on the credibility of the confessions of witches, gave an entire chapter to the effect of bells in calming atmospheric disturbances.

Basing his general doctrine upon the first chapter of Job and the second chapter of Ephesians, he insisted on the reality of diabolic agency in storms; and then, by theological reasoning, corroborated by the statements extorted in the torture chamber, he showed the efficacy of bells in putting the hellish legions to flight.( 247) This continued, therefore, an accepted tenet, developed in every nation, and coming to its climax near the end of the seventeenth century.

At that period--the period of Isaac Newton--Father Augustine de Angelis, rector of the Clementine College at Rome, published under the highest Church authority his lectures upon meteorology.