 Applying these causes, Pomponazzi explained that many of those accused of necromancy, like the medieval physicians and astrologers Pietro d’Abano and Cecco d’Ascoli, were merely very knowledgeable and capable of applying actives to passives (4.1). Moreover, it is possible that some humans possess extraordinary occult powers that allow them to affect cures through touch, like the kings of France, or to perform other marvelous feats such as charming snakes and opening doors without touching them (4.2). Pomponazzi argued that the powers of imagination can produce real effects. For example, he cited the widespread belief that women’s thoughts at the time of conception will produce a fetus that is similar to those thoughts. Therefore, the power of fascination and imaginative powers transmitted through vapors might explain unexpected cures and diseases just as they are supposedly responsible for the spread of leprosy and plague (4.3). While Pomponazzi admitted that some supposedly magical works are acts of deception—such as fraudulent magicians conjuring through sieves—he allowed that it might be possible that some men possess natural occult powers that allow them to move a sieve or transmit vapors through prayers so that they form images on mirrors (4.4). Pomponazzi used this analysis to respond to the possible objection that these three kinds of natural causes eliminate the acceptance of miracles. He maintained that many the deeds reported in the Bible can be “superficially reduced to natural causes”, but that some cannot, such as the resurrection of Lazarus, the eclipse during the crucifixion of Jesus, and the satisfaction of the hunger of a thousand people with five loaves of bread and two fish (6.7). Furthermore, while he conceded that there is a remote possibility that the cross found in Saint Catherine’s heart and Saint Francis’s stigmata arose from natural causes, he nonetheless stated it is more likely and more pious to understand them as miracles (6.8).