annals of witchcraft. In a work called "The Theatre of God's
Judgments," published, in London, by Thomas Beard in 1612, there is the
following passage: "It was a very lamentable spectacle that chanced to
the Governor of Mascon, a magician, whom the Devil snatched up in
dinner-while, and hoisted aloft, carrying him three times about the
town of Mascon, in the presence of many beholders, to whom he cried in
this manner, 'Help, help, my friends!' so that the whole town stood
amazed thereat; yea, and the remembrance of this strange accident
sticketh at this day fast in the minds of all the inhabitants of this
country." A malicious and bigoted monk, who discharged the office of
chief legend-maker to the Benedictine Abbey, in the vicinity of Mascon,
fabricated this ridiculous story for the purpose of bringing the
Governor into disrepute. An account of another diabolical visitation,
suggested, it is probable, by the one just described, was issued from
the press, under the title of "The Devil of Mascon," during the
lifetime of Boyle, who gave his sanction to the work, promoted its
version into English, and, as late as 1678, publicly declared his
belief of the supernatural transaction it related.
The subject of demonology, in all its forms and phases, embracing
witchcraft, held a more commanding place throughout Europe, in the
literature of the centuries immediately preceding the eighteenth, than
any other. Works of the highest pretension, elaborate, learned,
voluminous, and exhausting, were published,[i.361] by the authority of
governments and universities, to expound it. It was regarded as
occupying the most eminent department of jurisprudence, as well as of
science and theology.
Raphael De La Torre and Adam Tanner published treatises establishing
the right and duty of ecclesiastical tribunals to punish all who
practised or dealt with the arts of demonology. In 1484, Sprenger came
out with his famous book, "Malleus Maleficarum;" or, the "Hammer of
Witches." Paul Layman, in 1629, issued an elaborate work on "Judicial
Processes against Sorcerers and Witches." The following is the title of
a bulky volume of some seven hundred pages: "Demonology, or Natural
Magic or demoniacal, lawful and unlawful, also open or secret, by the
intervention and invocation of a Demon," published in 1612. It consists
of four books, treating of the crime of witchcraft, and its punishment
in the ordinary tribunals and the Inquisitorial office. Its author was
Don Francisco Torreblanca Villalpando, of Cordova, Advocate Royal in
the courts of Grenada. It was republished in 1623, by command of Philip
III. of Spain, on the recommendation of the Fiscal General, and with
the sanction of the Royal Council and the Holy Inquisition. This work
may be considered as establishing and defining the doctrines, in
reference to witchcraft, prevailing in all Catholic countries. It was
indorsed by royal, judicial, academical, and ecclesiastical approval;
is replete with extraordinary erudition, arranged in the most
scientific form, em[i.362]bracing in a methodical classification all
the minutest details of the subject, and codifying it into a complete
system of law. There was no particular in all the proceedings and all
the doctrines brought out at the trials in Salem, which did not find
ample justification and support in this work of Catholic, imperial, and
European authority.
But perhaps the writer of the greatest influence on this subject in
England and America, during the whole of the seventeenth century, was
William Perkins, "the learned, pious, and painful preacher of God's
Word, at St. Andrew's, in Cambridge," where he died, in 1602, aged
forty-four years. He was quite a voluminous author; and many of his
works were translated into French, Dutch, Italian, and Spanish. Fuller,
in "The Holy State," selects him as the impersonation of the qualities
requisite to "the Faithful Minister." In his glowing eulogium upon his
learning and talents, he says:—
"He would pronounce the word _damne_ with such an emphasis as left a
doleful echo in his auditors' ears a good while after. And, when
catechist of Christ's College, in expounding the Commandments, applied
them so home,—able almost to make his hearers' hearts fall down, and
hairs to stand upright. But, in his older age, he altered his voice,
and remitted much of his former rigidness, often professing that to
preach mercy was that proper office of the ministers of the
gospel."—"Our Perkins brought the schools into the pulpit, and,
unshelling their controversies out of their hard school-terms, made
thereof plain and wholesome meat for his peo[i.363]ple; for he had a
capacious head, with angles winding, and roomy enough to lodge all
controversial intricacies."—"He had a rare felicity in speedy reading
of books; so that, as it were, riding post through an author, he took
strict notice of all passages. Perusing books so speedily, one would
think he read nothing; so accurately, one would think he read all."
An octavo volume, written by this great scholar and divine, was
published at Cambridge in England, under the title, "Discourse of the
Damned Art of Witchcraft." It went through several editions, and had a
wide and permanent circulation.
This work, the character of which is sufficiently indicated in its
emphatic title, was the great authority on the subject with our
fathers; and Mr. Parris had a copy of it in his possession when the
proceedings in reference to witchcraft began at Salem Village.
John Gaule published an octavo volume in London, in 1646, entitled,
"Select Cases of Conscience concerning Witches and Witchcraft." He is
one of the most exact writers on the subject, and arranges witches in
the following classes: "1. The diviner, gypsy, or fortune-telling
witch; 2. The astrologian, star-gazing, planetary, prognosticating
witch; 3. The chanting, canting, or calculating witch, who works by
signs and numbers; 4. The venefical, or poisoning witch; 5. The
exorcist, or conjuring witch; 6. The gastronomic witch; 7. The magical,
speculative, sciential, or arted witch; 8. The necromancer."
Besides innumerable writers of this class, who spread out the
scholastic learning on the subject,[i.364] and presented it in a
logical and theological form, there were others who treated it in a
more popular style, and invested it with the charms of elegant
literature. Henry Hallywell published an octavo in London, in 1681, in
which, while the main doctrines of witchcraft as then almost
universally received are enforced, an attempt was made to divest it of
some of its most repulsive and terrible features. He gives the
following account of the means by which a person may place himself
beyond the reach of the power of witchcraft:—
"It is possible for the soul to arise to such a height, and become so
divine, that no witchcraft or evil demons can have any power upon the
body. When the bodily life is too far invigorated and awakened, and
draws the intellect, the flower and summity of the soul, into a
conspiration with it, then are we subject and obnoxious to magical
assaults. For magic or sorcery, being founded only in this lower or
mundane spirit, he that makes it his business to be freed and released
from all its blandishments and flattering devocations, and endeavors
wholly to withdraw himself from the love of corporeity and too near a
sympathy with the frail flesh, he, by it, enkindles such a divine
principle as lifts him above the fate of this inferior world, and
adorns his mind with such an awful majesty that beats back all
enchantments, and makes the infernal fiends tremble at his presence,
hating those vigorous beams of light which are so contrary and
repugnant to their dark natures."
The mind of this beautiful writer found encouragement and security in
the midst of the diabolical spir[i.365]its, with whom he believed the
world to be infested, in the following views and speculations:—
"For there is a chain of government that runs down from God, the
Supreme Monarch, whose bright and piercing eyes look through all that
he has made, to the lowest degree of the creation; and there are
presidential angels of empires and kingdoms, and such as under them
have the tutelage of private families; and, lastly, every man's
particular guardian genius. Nor is the inanimate or material world left
to blind chance or fortune; but there are, likewise, mighty and potent
spirits, to whom is committed the guidance and care of the fluctuating
and uncertain motions of it, and by their ministry, fire and vapor,
storms and tempests, snow and hail, heat and cold, are all kept within
such bounds and limits as are most serviceable to the ends of
Providence. They take care of the variety of seasons, and superintend
the tillage and fruits of the earth; upon which account, Origen calls
them _invisible_ husbandmen. So that, all affairs and things being
under the inspection and government of these incorporeal beings, the
power of the dark kingdom and its agents is under a strict confinement
and restraint; and they cannot bring a general mischief upon the world
without a special permission of a superior Providence."
Spenser has the same imagery and sentiment:—
"How oft do they their silver bowers leave,
To come to succor us, that succor want?
How oft do they with golden pinions cleave
The flitting skies, like flying pursuivant,
Against foul fiends to aid us militant?
They for us fight, they watch and duly ward,
And their bright squadrons round about us plant,
And all for love and nothing for reward:
Oh! why should heavenly God to man have such regard?"
[i.366]
While there can be no doubt that the superstitious opinions we have
been reviewing were diffused generally among the great body of the
people of all ranks and conditions, it would be unjust to truth not to
mention that there were some persons who looked upon them as empty
fables and vain imaginations. Error has never yet made a complete and
universal conquest. In the darkest ages and most benighted regions, it
has been found impossible utterly to extinguish the light of reason.
There always have been some in whose souls the torch of truth has been
kept burning with vestal watchfulness: we can discern its glimmer here
and there through the deepest night that has yet settled upon the
earth. In the midst of the most extravagant superstition, there have
been individuals who have disowned the popular belief, and considered
it a mark of wisdom and true philosophy to discard the idle fancies and
absurd schemes of faith that possessed the minds of the great mass of
their contemporaries. This was the case with Horace, as appears from
lines thus quite freely but effectively translated:—
"These dreams and terrors magical,
These miracles and witches,
Night-walking spirites or Thessal bugs,
Esteeme them not two rushes."
The intellect of Seneca also rose above the reach of the popular
credulity with respect to the agency of supernatural beings and the
efficacy of mysterious charms.
If we could but obtain access to the secret thoughts[i.367] of the
wisest philosophers and of the men of genius of antiquity, we should
probably find that many of them were superior to the superstitions of
their times. Even in the thick darkness of the dark ages, there were
minds too powerful to be kept in chains by error and delusion.
Henry Cornelius Agrippa, who was born in the latter part of the
fifteenth century, was, perhaps, the greatest philosopher and scholar
of his period. In early life, he was very much devoted to the science
of magic, and was a strenuous supporter of demonology and witchcraft.
In the course of his studies and meditations, he was led to a change of
views on these subjects, and did all that he could to warn others from
putting confidence in such vain, frivolous, and absurd superstitions as
then possessed the world. The consequence was, that he was denounced
and prosecuted as a conjurer, and charged with having written against
magic and witchcraft, in order the more securely to shelter himself
from the suspicion of practising them. As an instance of the calumnies
that were heaped upon him, I would mention that Paulus Jovius asserted
that "Cornelius Agrippa went always accompanied with an evil spirit in
the similitude of a black dog;" and that, when the time of his death
drew near, "he took off the enchanted collar from the dog's neck, and
sent him away with these terms, 'Get thee hence, thou cursed beast,
which hast utterly destroyed me:' neither was the dog ever seen after."
Butler, in his "Hudibras," has not neg[i.368]lected to celebrate this
remarkable connection between Satan and the man of learning:—
"Agrippa kept a Stygian pug
I' th' garb and habit of a dog,
That was his tutor; and the cur
Read to th' occult philosopher."
John Wierus wrote an elaborate, learned, and judicious book, in which
he treated at large of magic, sorcery, and witchcraft, and did all that
scholarship, talent, and philosophy could do to undermine and subvert
the whole system of the prevailing popular superstition. But he fared
no better than his predecessor, patron, and master, Agrippa; for, like
him, he was accused of having attempted to persuade the world that
there was no reality in supernatural charms and diabolical
confederacies, in order that he might devote himself to them without
suspicion or molestation, and was borne down by the bigotry and
fanaticism of his times.
King James merely gave utterance to the general sentiment, and
pronounced the verdict of popular opinion, in the following extract
from the preface to his "Demonologie:" "Wierus, a German physician,
sets out a public apologie for all these crafts-folkes, whereby,
procuring for them impunitie, he plainly bewrays himself to have been
of that profession."
In 1584, a quarto volume was published in London, the work of Reginald
Scott, a learned English gentleman, whose title sufficiently indicates
its import, "The Discovery of Witchcraft, wherein the lewde dealing
of[i.369] witches and witchmongers is notably detected; the knavery of
conjurers, the impiety of inchanters, the folly of soothsayers, the
impudent falsehood of cozeners, the infidelity of atheists, the
pestilent practices of pythonists, the curiosities of figure-casters,
the vanity of dreamers, the beggarly art of alcumstrie, the abomination
of idolatrie, the horrible art of poisoning, the virtue and power of
natural magic, and all the conveniencies of legerdemaine and juggling,
are discovered, &c."
In 1599, Samuel Harsnett, Archbishop of York, wrote a work, published
in London, to expose certain persons who pretended to have the power of
casting out devils, and detecting their "deceitful trade." This writer
was among the first to bring the power of bold satire and open
denunciation to bear against the superstitions of demonology. He thus
describes the motives and the methods of such impostors:—
"Out of these," saith he, "is shaped us the true idea of a witch,—an
old, weather-beaten crone, having her chin and her knees meeting for
age, walking like a bow, leaning on a staff; hollow-eyed, untoothed,
furrowed on her face, having her limbs trembling with the palsy, going
mumbling in the streets; one that hath forgotten her Pater-noster, and
yet hath a shrewd tongue to call a drab a drab. If she hath learned of
an old wife, in a chimney-end, Pax, Max, Fax, for a spell, or can say
Sir John Grantham's curse for the miller's eels, 'All ye that have
stolen the miller's eels, Laudate dominum de coelis: and all they that
have consented thereto, Benedicamus domino:' why then, beware! look
about[i.370] you, my neighbors. If any of you have a sheep sick of the
giddies, or a hog of the mumps, or a horse of the staggers, or a
knavish boy of the school, or an idle girl of the wheel, or a young
drab of the sullens, and hath not fat enough for her porridge, or
butter enough for her bread, and she hath a little help of the epilepsy
or cramp, to teach her to roll her eyes, wry her mouth, gnash her
teeth, startle with her body, hold her arms and hands stiff, &c.; and
then, when an old Mother Nobs hath by chance called her an idle young
housewife, or bid the Devil scratch her, then no doubt but Mother Nobs
is the witch, and the young girl is owl blasted, &c. They that have
their brains baited and their fancies distempered with the imaginations
and apprehensions of witches, conjurers, and fairies, and all that
lymphatic chimera, I find to be marshalled in one of these five ranks:
children, fools, women, cowards, sick or black melancholic discomposed
wits."
In 1669, a work was published in London with the following title: "The
Question of Witchcraft Debated; or, a Discourse against their Opinions
that affirm Witches." It is a work of great merit, and would do honor
to a scholar and logician of the present day. The author was John
Wagstaffe, of Oxford University: he is described as a crooked,
shrivelled, little man, of a most despicable appearance. This
circumstance, together with his writings against the popular belief in
witchcraft, led his academical associates to accuse him, some of them
in sport, but others with grave suspicion, of being a wizard. Wood, the
historian of Oxford, says that "he died in a manner distracted,
occasioned by a deep conceit of his own parts, and by a
continual[i.371] bibbing of strong and high-tasted liquors." But poor
Wagstaffe was assailed by something more than private raillery and
slander. His heretical sentiments exposed him to the battery of the
host of writers who will always be found ready to advocate a prevailing
opinion. But Wagstaffe was not left entirely alone to defend the cause
of reason and truth. He had one most zealous advocate and ardent
admirer in the author of a work on "The Doctrine of Devils," published
in 1676. This writer sums up a panegyric upon Wagstaffe's performance,
by pronouncing it "a judicious book, that contains more good reason,
true religion, and right Christianity, than all those lumps and
cartloads of luggage that hath been fardled up by all the faggeters of
demonologistical winter-tales, and witchcraftical legendaries, since
they first began to foul clean paper."
Dr. Balthasar Bekker, of Amsterdam, who was equally eminent in
astronomy, philosophy, and theology, published in 1691 a learned and
powerful work, called "The World Bewitched," in which he openly
assailed the doctrines of witchcraft and of the Devil, and anticipated
many of the views and arguments presented in Farmer's excellent
publications. As a reward for his exertions to enlighten his
fellow-creatures, he was turned out of the ministry, and assaulted by
nearly all the writers of his age.
Dr. Bekker was one of the ablest and boldest writers of his day, and
did much to advance the cause of natural science, scriptural
interpretation, and the princi[i.372]ples of enlightened Christianity.
In 1680 he published an "Inquiry concerning Comets," rescuing them from
the realm of superstition, placing them within the natural physical
laws, and exploding the then-received opinion, that, in any way, they
are the presages or forerunners of evil. His "Exposition on the Prophet
Daniel" gives proof of his learning and judgment. His great merits were
recognized by John Locke and Richard Bentley. In the preface to his
"World Bewitched," he says, that it grieved him to see the great
honors, powers, and miracles which are ascribed to the Devil. "It has
come to that pass," to use his own language, "that men think it piety
and godliness to ascribe a great many wonders to the Devil, and impiety
and heresy, if a man will not believe that the Devil can do what a
thousand persons say he does. It is now reckoned godliness, if a man
who fears God fear also the Devil. If he be not afraid of the Devil, he
passes for an atheist, who does not believe in God, because he cannot
think that there are two gods, the one good, the other bad. But these,
I think, with much more reason, may be called ditheists. For my part,
if, on account of my opinion, they will give me a new name, let them
call me a monotheist, a believer of but one God." The work struck down
the whole system of demonology and witchcraft, by proving that there
never was really such a thing as sorcery or possession, and that devils
have no influence over human affairs or the persons of men. It is not
surprising that it raised a great clamor. The wonder is that it did not
cost him[i.373] his life. It is probable that his protection was the
confidence the people had in his character and learning. Attempts were
made to diminish that confidence, and bring him into odium, by
levelling against him every form of abuse. A medal was struck, and
extensively circulated, representing the Devil, clothed like a minister
or priest, riding on an ass. The device was so arranged as to excite
ridicule and abhorrence, in the vulgar mind, against Bekker. But it was
found impossible to turn the popular feeling, which had set in his
favor; and his persecutors and defamers were completely baffled. He was
followed, soon after, by the learned Thomasius, whose writings against
demonology produced a decided effect upon the convictions of the age.
While Bekker, and the other writers of his class, endeavored to
overthrow the superstitious practices and fancies then prevalent
respecting demonology and communications with spiritual beings, they so
far acceded to the popular theology as to maintain the doctrine of the
personality of the Devil. They believed in the existence of the
arch-fiend, but denied his agency in human affairs. They held that he
was kept confined "to bottomless perdition, there to dwell—
"In adamantine chains and penal fire."
Sir Robert Filmer, in 1680, published "An Advertisement to the jurymen
of England, touching Witches," in which he criticised and condemned
many of the opinions and methods then countenanced on the
subject.[i.374]
But Bekker, Thomasius, and Filmer appeared too late to operate upon the
prevalent opinions of Europe or America prior to the witchcraft
delusion of 1692. The productions of the other writers, in the same
direction, to whom I have referred, probably had a very limited
circulation, and made at the time but little impression. Error is
seldom overthrown by mere reasoning. It yields only to the logic of
events. No power of learning or wit could have rooted the witchcraft
superstitions out of the minds of men. Nothing short of a demonstration
of their deformities, follies, and horrors, such as here was held up to
the view of the world, could have given their death-blow. This was the
final cause of Salem Witchcraft, and makes it one of the great
landmarks in the world's history.
A full and just view of the position and obligations of the persons who
took part in the transactions at Salem requires a previous knowledge of
the principles and the state of the law, as it was then in force and
understood by the courts, and all concerned in judicial proceedings.
Although the ancients did not regard pretended intercourse between
magicians and enchanters and spiritual beings as necessarily or always
criminal, we find that they enacted laws against the abuse of the power
supposed to result from the connection. The old Roman code of the
Twelve Tables contained the following prohibition: "That they should
not bewitch the fruits of the earth, nor use any charms, to draw their
neighbor's corn into their own fields." There were several special
edicts on the subject during[i.375] the existence of the Roman State.
In the early Christian councils, sorcery was frequently made the object
of denunciation. At Laodicea, for instance, in the year 364, it was
voted to excommunicate any clergymen who were magicians, enchanters,
astrologers, or mathematicians! The Bull of Pope Innocent VIII., near
the close of the fifteenth century, has already been mentioned.
Dr. Turner, in his history of the Anglo-Saxons, says that they had laws
against sorcerers and witches, but that they did not punish them with
death. There was an English statute against witchcraft, in the reign of
Henry VIII., and another in that of Elizabeth.