There was staying in the city a man named Simon, who had been practicing magic there and mystifying the Samaritan people, giving himself out to be some great Being.

And they paid attention to him because they had for a long time been mystified by his magic arts.

While a number of people, who had practiced magic, collected their books and burnt them publicly; and on reckoning up the price of these, they found it amounted to five thousand pounds.