gained through an investigation of the more abstruse laws of nature,
have invested the word “magic” with terror. But magic simply means
knowledge of the effect of certain natural, but generally unknown laws;
the secret operation of natural causes, according to Bacon and other
philosophers; consequences resulting from control of the invisible
powers of nature, such as are shown in the electrical appliances of the
day, which a few centuries since would have been termed witchcraft.
Seeking to compel the aid of spirits, was understood as magic at an
early day. Lenormant says the object of magic in Chaldea, was to
conjure the spirits giving minute description of the ancient formula.
Scientific knowledge in the hands of the church alone, was a great
element of spiritual and temporal power, aiding it in more fully
subduing the human will. The testimony of the ages entirely destroys
the assertion sometimes made that witchcraft was merely a species of
hysteria. Every discovery of science is a nearer step towards knowledge
of the laws governing “the Accursed Sciences,” as everything connected
with psychic power in possession of the laity was termed by the church.
“Her seven evidences for possession” included nearly all forms of
mesmerism. All modern investigations tend to prove what was called
witchcraft, to have been in most instances the action of psychic laws
not yet fully understood. An extremely suggestive article appeared
in the January and February numbers of _The Path_ 1887, by C. H. A.
Bjerregaard entitled, “The Elementals and the Elementary Spirits.” In
it Mr. Bjerregaard referred to the Pacinian Corpuscles, the discovery
of an Italian physician in 1830 and 1840. He said:
Pacini found in all the sensible nerves of the fingers many
elliptical whitish corpuscles. He compared them to the
electrical organs of the torpedo and described them as animal
magneto-motors, or organs of animal magnetism, and so did
Henle and Holliker, two German anatomists who have studied and
described these corpuscles very minutely.
In the human body they are found in great numbers in
connection with the nerves of the hand, also in those of
the foot.... The ecstatic dances of the enthusiasts and the
not-sinking of somnambulists in water, or their ability to
use the soles of their feet as organs of perception, and the
ancient art of healing by the soles of the feet—all these
facts explain the mystery.
They are found sparingly on the spinal nerves, and on the
plexuses of the sympathetic, but never on the nerves of
motion.... Anatomists are interested in these Pacinian
corpuscles because of the novel aspect in which they present
the constituent parts of the nerve-tube, placed in the heart
of a system of concentric membranous capsules with intervening
fluid, and divested of that layer which they (the anatomists)
regard as an isolator and protector of the more potential
central axis within.
This apparatus—almost formed like a voltaic pile, is the
instrument for that peculiar vital energy, known more or less
to all students as Animal Magnetism.
Since the cat is somewhat famous in all witchcraft, let me
state, that in the mesentery of the cat, they can be seen in
large numbers with the naked eye, as small oval-shaped grains
a little smaller than hemp-seeds. A few have been found in the
ox (symbol of the priestly office,) but they are wanting in
all birds, amphibia and fishes.
“Magic” whether brought about by the aid of spirits or simply through
an understanding of secret natural laws, is of two kinds, “white” and
“black,” according as its intent and consequences are evil or good, and
in this respect does not differ from the use made of the well known
laws of nature, which are ever of good or evil character, in the hands
of good or evil persons. To the church in its powerful control of the
human will, must be attributed the use of “black magic,” in its most
injurious form. Proof that knowledge of the mysterious laws governing
ordinary natural phenomena still exists even among civilized people, is
indubitable. Our American Indians in various portions of the continent,
according to authorities, also possess power to produce storms of
thunder, lightning and rain.[29]
A vast amount of evidence exists, to show that the word “witch”
formerly signified a woman of superior knowledge. Many of the persons
called witches doubtless possessed a super-abundance of the Pacinian
corpuscles in hands and feet, enabling them to swim when cast into
water bound, to rise in the air against the ordinary action of gravity,
to heal by a touch, and in some instances to sink into a condition of
catalepsy, perfectly unconscious of torture when applied. Many were
doubtless psychic sensitives of high powers similar perhaps to the
“Seeress of Prevorst,” whose peculiar characteristics were the subject
of investigation by Dr. Kerner, about the end of the witch period,
his report forming one of the most mysteriously interesting portions
of psychic literature. The “Seeress” was able to perceive the hidden
principles of all vegetable or mineral substances, whether beneficial
or injurious. Dr. Kerner stated that her magnetic condition might be
divided into four degrees.
First: that in which she ordinarily was when she appeared to
be awakened but on the contrary was the first stage of her
inner life, many persons of whom it was not expected and who
was not aware of it themselves, being in this state.
Second: the magnetic dream, which she believed to be the
condition of many persons who were regarded as insane.
Third: the half wakening state when she spoke and wrote the
inner language, her spirit then being in intimate conjunction
with her soul.
Fourth: her clairvoyant state.
With the investigation of Dr. Kerner, the discoveries of Galvani,
Pacini, and those more recently connected with electricity, notably of
Edison and Nikolas Tesla, the world seems upon the eve of important
knowledge which may throw full light upon the peculiar nerve action
of the witch period, when a holocaust of women were sacrificed,
victims of the ignorance and barbarity of the church, which thus
retarded civilization and delayed spiritual progress for many hundred
years. Besides the natural psychics who formed a large proportion
of the victims of this period, other women with a natural spirit of
investigation made scientific discoveries with equally baleful effect
upon themselves; the one fact of a woman’s possessing knowledge serving
to bring her under the suspicion and accusation of the church. Henry
More, a learned Cambridge graduate of the seventeenth century wrote
a treatise on witchcraft explanatory of the term “witch” which he
affirmed simply signified a wise, or learned woman. It meant “uncommon”
but not unlawful knowledge or skill. It will assist in forming an
opinion to know that the word “witch” is from _wekken_, to prophesy, a
direct bearing upon the psychic powers of many such persons. The modern
Slavonian or Russian name for witch, _vjedma_, is from the verb “to
know” signifying much the same as Veda.[30] Muller says _Veda_ means
the same as the wise, “wisdom.” The Sanskrit word _Vidma_ answers to
the German _wir wissen_, which literally means “we know.” A Russian
name for the witch _Zaharku_, is derived from the verb _Znat_, to
know.[31] A curious account of modern Russian belief in witchcraft
is to be found in Madame Blavatsky’s _Isis Unveiled_. The German
word _Heke_, that is, witch, primarily signified priestess, a wise
or superior woman who in a sylvan temple worshiped those gods and
goddesses that together governed earth and heaven. Not alone but with
thousands of the people for whom she officiated she was found there
especially upon Walpurgis Night, the chief Hexen (witch) Sabbat of the
north. A German scholar furnished this explanation.
The German word Heke, (witch) is a compound word from “hag”
and “idisan” or “disan.” Hag means a beautiful landscape,
woodland, meadow, field, altogether. Idisen means female
deities, wise-women. Hexen-Sabbat, or Walpurgis Night is
May twelfth. Perfume and avocation—originally the old
gods—perverted by the priests. It is a remnant of the great
gathering to worship the old deities, when Christianity had
overshadowed them. A monument of the wedding of Woden or Odin
with Freia—Sun and Earth at spring time.
The Saxon festival “Eostre,” the christian Easter, was celebrated in
April, each of these festivals at a time when winter having released
its sway, smiling earth giving her life to healing herbs and leaves,
once more welcomed her worshipers. In the south of Europe, the month
of October peculiarly belonged to the witches.[32] The first of May,
May-day, was especially devoted by those elementals known as fairies,
whose special rites were dances upon the green sward, leaving curious
mementoes of their visits in the circles known as “Fairies Rings.” In
reality the original meaning of “witch” was a wise woman. So also the
word _Sab_ means sage or wise, and _Saba_ a host or congregation;[33]
while _Bac_, _Boc_ and _Bacchus_[34] all originally signified
book.[35] _Sabs_ was the name of the day when the Celtic Druids gave
instruction and is the origin of our words Sabbath and Sunday. But
the degradation of learning, its almost total loss among christian
nations, an entire change in the signification of words, owing to
ignorance and superstition led to the strangest and most infamous
results. The earliest doctors among the common people of christian
Europe were women[36] who had learned the virtues and use of herbs.
The famous works of Paracelsus were but compilations of the knowledge
of these “wise women” as he himself stated. During the feudal ages
women were excellent surgeons, wounded warriors frequently falling
under their care and to the skill of these women were indebted for
recovery from dangerous wounds. Among the women of savage races to much
greater extent than among the men, a knowledge of the healing powers
of plants and herbs is to this day found. But while for many hundred
years the knowledge of medicine, and its practice among the poorer
classes was almost entirely in the hands of women and many discoveries
in science are due to them, yet an acquaintance of herbs soothing to
pain, or healing in their qualities, was then looked upon as having
been acquired through diabolical agency. Even those persons cured
through the instrumentality of some woman, were ready when the hour
came to assert their belief in her indebtedness to the devil for her
knowledge. Not only were the common people themselves ignorant of all
science, but their brains were filled with superstitious fears, and the
belief that knowledge had been first introduced to the world through
woman’s obedience to the devil. In the fourteenth century the church
decreed that any woman who healed others without having duly studied,
was a witch and should suffer death; yet in that same century, 1527,
at Basle, Paracelsus threw all his medical works, including those of
Hippocrates and Galen into the fire, saying that he knew nothing except
what he had learned from witches.[37] As late as 1736, the persecution
of her male compeers cast Elizabeth Blackwell, an English woman
physician, into prison for debt. Devoting herself even behind the bars
to her loved science, she prepared the first medical botany given to
the world. The modern discovery of anaesthetics by means of whose use
human suffering can be so greatly ameliorated, is justly claimed as the
greatest boon that science has conferred upon mankind, yet it must not
be forgotten that this medical art of mitigating pain, is but an olden
one rediscovered. Methods of causing insensibility to pain were known
to the ancient world. During the middle ages these secrets were only
understood by the persecuted women doctors of that period, subjected
under church rule to torture, burning at the stake or drowning as
witches. The use of pain-destroying medicaments by women, can be
traced back from five hundred to a thousand years. At the time that
witchcraft became the great ogre against which the church expended all
its terrific powers, women doctors employed anaesthetics to mitigate
the pains and perils of motherhood,[38] throwing the sufferer into a
deep sleep when the child entered the world. They made use of Solanae,
especially Belladonna. But that woman should find relief at this hour
of intense suffering and peril when a new being entered the world,
provoked open hostility from the church. The use of mitigating herbs
assailed that theory of the church which having placed the creation of
sin upon woman, still further inculcated the doctrine that she must
undergo continual penance, the greatest suffering being a punishment
in nowise equal to her deserts. Its teachings that she had therefore
been especially cursed by her Maker with suffering and sorrow at this
period, rendered the use of mitigating remedies during childbirth,
dangerous alike to the “wise woman” and the mother for whose relief
they were employed[39]. Although the present century has shown similar
opposition by the church to the use of anaesthetics for women at
this time, it is almost impossible to depict the sentiment against
such relief which made the witchcraft period one of especial terror
to womankind—an age that looked upon the slightest attempt at such
alleviation as proof of collusion with the devil. So strong was the
power of the church, so universal the belief in the guilt of all women,
that even those sufferers who had availed themselves of the knowledge
of the “wise woman” did so in fear as calling in the aid of evil, and
were ready to testify against her to whom they had been indebted for
alleviation of pain, whenever required by the dread mandate of the
church. A strong natural bias toward the study of medicine, together
with deepest sympathy for suffering humanity, were required in order
to sustain the “wise woman” amid the perils constantly surrounding
her; many such women losing their lives as witches simply because of
their superior medical and surgical knowledge. Death by torture was
the method of the church for the repression of woman’s intellect,
knowledge being held as evil and dangerous in her hands. Ignorance was
regarded as an especial virtue in woman, and fear held her in this
condition. Few women dared be wise, after thousands of their sex had
gone to death by drowning or burning because of their knowledge. The
superior learning of witches was recognized in the widely extended
belief of their ability to work miracles. The witch was in reality the
profoundest thinker, the most advanced scientist of those ages. The
persecution which for ages waged against witches was in reality an
attack upon science at the hands of the church. As knowledge has ever
been power, the church feared its use in woman’s hands, and leveled its
deadliest blows at her. Although the church in its myth of the fall
attributes knowledge to woman’s having eaten of its tree, yet while not
scrupling to make use of the results of her disobedience for its own
benefit, it has been most earnest in its endeavors to prevent her from
like use. No less today than during the darkest period of its history,
is the church the great opponent of woman’s education, every advance
step for her having found the church antagonistic.
Every kind of self-interest was brought into play in these accusations
of witchcraft against women physicians: greed, malice, envy, hatred,
fear, the desire of clearing one’s self from suspicion, all became
motives. Male physicians not skillful enough to cure disease would
deliberately swear that there could be but one reason for their
failure—the use of witchcraft against them. As the charge of witchcraft
not only brought disrepute but death upon the “wise woman” at the hands
of the church, she was soon compelled to abandon both the practice
of medicine and surgery, and for many hundred years but few women
doctors were to be found in christian countries. It is, however, a
noticeable fact that Madam La Chapelle, an eminent woman accoucher of
France, during the present century, and M. Chaussure revived the use of
Belladonna[40] during parturition, thus acknowledging the scientific
acquirements of serf women and “witches.” Since the re-entrance of
woman into the medical profession within the past few years, the world
has been indebted for a knowledge of the cause and cure of certain
forms of disease peculiar to woman, to the skill of those physicians of
her own sex whom the church so long banished from practice.
Through its opposition to the use of anaesthetics by the women
physicians of the witch period, the church again interposed the weight
of her mighty arm to crush science, leaving the load of preventable
suffering of all kinds upon the world for many hundred years longer,
or until the light of a scientific civilization threw discredit upon
her authority. History proves that women were the earliest chemists.
The witch period also shows us the germs of a medical system, the
Homeopathic, supposed to be of modern origin, in _similia similibus
curantur_. Among the strange epidemics of these ages, a dancing mania
appeared; Belladonna among whose effects is the desire of dancing,
was employed as a cure of the “Dancing Mania,” and thus the theory
of Hahnemann was forestalled. During the witch period these sages or
wise-women were believed to be endowed with a supernatural or magical
power of curing diseases. They were also regarded as prophets to whom
the secrets of the future were known. The women of ancient Germany,
of Gaul and among the Celts were especially famous for their healing
powers,[41] possessing knowledge by which wounds and diseases that
baffled the most expert male physicians were cured. The women of
a still more ancient period, the fame of whose magical powers has
descended to the present time, Circe, Medea and Thracia, were evidently
physicians of the highest skill. The secret of compounding herbs and
drugs left by Circe to her descendants, gave them power over the most
poisonous serpents. Chief among the many herbs, plants and roots whose
virtues were discovered by Medea, that of Aconite stands pre-eminent.
The Thracian nation took its name from the famous Thracia whose medical
skill and knowledge of herbs was so great that the country deemed it an
honor to thus perpetuate her name.
Aside from women of superior intelligence who were almost invariably
accused of witchcraft, the old, the insane, the bed-ridden, the
idiotic,[42] also fell under condemnation. The first investigation by
Rev. Cotton Mather in America resulted in the hanging of a half-witted
Quaker woman. Later still, an Indian woman, an insane man, and another
woman who was bed-ridden were also accused. Under the present theories
regarding human rights, it seems scarcely possible that less than two
hundred years ago such practices were not only common in England,
but had also been brought into America by the Puritan Fathers. The
humiliation and tortures of women increased in proportion to the
spread of christianity,[43] and the broader area over which man’s sole
authority in church and state was disseminated. As the supreme extent
of spiritual wrong grew out of the bondage of the church over free
thought, so the extreme of physical wrong rose from the growth of the
inquisitional or paternal spirit, which assumed that one human being
possessed divine authority over another human being. Paternalism,
a species of condensed patriarchism, runs through ecclesiastical,
civil, and common law. Down to the time of the American revolution,
individuality was an uncomprehended word; many hundred crimes were
punishable by death. That of pressing to death, _peine-fort-et-dure_,
the strong and hard pain, was practiced upon both men and women in
England for five hundred years and brought by the pilgrims to New
England. The culprit was placed in the dark lower room of some prison,
naked, upon the bare ground without clothing or rushes underneath or
to cover him. The legs and arms were extended toward the four corners
of the room and as great a weight placed upon the body as could be
supported.
“The first day he (or she) is to have three morsels of barley bread;
upon the second day three draughts of water standing next to the door
of the prison, without bread, and this to be his (or her) diet till he
(or she) die.”
It is computed from historical records that nine millions of persons
were put to death for witchcraft after 1484, or during a period of
three hundred years, and this estimate does not include the vast
number who were sacrificed in the preceding centuries upon the same
accusation. The greater number of this incredible multitude were
women. Under catholicism, those condemned as sorcerers and witches,
as “heretics,” were in reality the most advanced thinkers of the
christian ages. Under that protestant pope, the Eighth Henry, an Act
of Parliament condemning witchcraft as felony was confirmed. Enacted
under Henry V, it had fallen into disuse, but numerous petitions
setting forth that witches and sorcerers were “wonderful many,” and
his majesty’s subjects persecuted to death by their devices, led to
its re-enactment. The methods used to extort confession without which
it was impossible in many cases to convict for witchcraft, led to the
grossest outrages upon woman. Searching the body of the suspected witch
for the marks of Satan, and the practice of shaving the whole body
before applying torture were occasions of atrocious indignities. It
was asserted that all who consorted with devils had some secret mark
about them, in some hidden place of their bodies; as the inside of the
lip, the hair of the eyebrows, inside of the thigh, the hollow of the
arm or still more private parts, from whence Satan drew nourishment.
This originated a class of men known as “Witch Prickers” who divesting
the supposed witch, whether maid, matron, or child, of all clothing
minutely examined all parts of her body for the devil’s sign. Woe to
the woman possessing a mole or other blemish upon her person; it was
immediately pointed to as Satan’s seal and as undeniable proof of
having sold herself to the devil. Belief in this sign existed among the
most educated persons. Albertus Pictus, an advocate in the Parliament
of Paris, declared he himself had seen a woman with the devil’s mark
on her shoulders, carried off the next day by the devil. Many authors
affirmed the trustworthiness of witch-marks. It was supposed that
upon touching the place the witch would be unable to speak. If under
the torture of having every portion of her body punctured by a sharp
instrument, the victim became no longer able to cry out, her silence
was an accepted proof of finding the witch-mark and her condemnation
was equally certain. So great was the number of accused, that these
men found profitable employment. The depth of iniquity to which greed
of money leads was never more forcibly shown than during witchcraft.
One Kincaid, a New England Witch Pricker, after stripping his victims
of all clothing, bound them hand and foot, then thrust pins into
every part of their bodies until exhausted and rendered speechless by
the torture, they were unable to scream, when he would triumphantly
proclaim that he had found the witch mark. Another confessed on the
gallows, to which a just fate finally condemned him, that he had
illegally caused the death of one hundred and twenty women whom he
had thus tortured. No means were considered too severe in order to
secure conviction. The Jesuit, Del Rio, said torture could scarcely be
properly administered without more or less dislocation of the joints,
and persons escaping conviction were frequently crippled for life.[44]
The church declared the female sex had always been most concerned in
the crime of christian witchcraft and as it was its aim to separate
woman from all connection with its ordinances, it also asserted that
the priestesses of antiquity held their high places by means of
witchcraft.