Witchcraft treated with great Severity--Cutting out
the Tongue--Laws of AEthelstane--Witchcraft in
England--Royal Writers--Sir Edward Cole's
Opinion--Statute of Elizabeth against Sorcerers--Law
of Mary Queen of Scotland against Witches--Law against
Witches abolished--Sir George Mackenzie on
Witchcraft--William Forbes on the same--Extracts from
Forbes's _Institute of the Law of Scotland_--Sir
Matthew Hale a Believer in Witchcraft--Trial of Rose
Cullender and Ann Duny--General Belief in the
Existence of Witches--Punishment of Witches, by whom
first countenanced--Pope John's Bull--Bishop
Jewell--Lord Bacon and the Law against
Witches--Fearful Slaughter of supposed
Witches--_Malleus Maleficarum_, or Hammer for
Witches--The last Persons executed in Scotland and
England for Witchcraft--First German Printers
condemned to be burned as Sorcerers--Reginald Scot on
the Fables of Witchcraft--Mr. E. Chambers's Views on
Witchcraft.
Witchcraft--the nature and theory of which will appear as we
proceed--was treated with great severity in early times. In 840 a law
was enacted in Scotland, making the punishment of witchcraft no less
than the cutting out of the tongue; and, by the laws of AEthelstane in
928, witchcraft in England was made a capital crime. Witches were
punished in the reign of Edward III.; and it suited the sanguinary
temperament of Henry VIII., as well as the pedantry of other royal
writers, to give written descriptions of this crime. Edicts were
promulgated against prophets, sorcerers, feeders of evil spirits,
charmers, and provokers of unlawful love. Sir Edward Cole thought it
would have been "a great defect in government to have suffered such
devilish abominations to pass with impunity."
By a statute of Elizabeth, passed in 1562, against sorcerers, it was
ordained that for a first offence the punishment was to be restricted
to standing in the pillory; for second and subsequent offences,
severer inflictions were to follow. Barrington estimates that in the
two hundred years during which the greatest severity against supposed
witches prevailed in England, thirty thousand judicial murders were
committed, under the guise of legal punishments for such imaginary
crimes.
A year later (1563) it was considered advisable by Queen Mary of
Scotland and her Parliament to pass an Act, having for its object the
punishment of persons guilty of any of the crimes under consideration.
The Act sets forth:--
"For-sa-meikle as the Queenis Majestie and the three
Estaites of this present parliament being informed of
the heavie and abominable superstition used be divers
of the lieges of this realm, be using of witchcraft,
sorcerie, and necromancie, and credence given thereto
in times by-gane, against the laws of God: And for
avoyding and away putting of all sik vaine
superstition in times to cum: It is statute and
ordained by the Queen's Majestie, and the three
Estaites foresaid, that na maner of person nor persons
of quhat-sum-ever estaite, degree, or condition they
be of, take upon hand in onie times hereafter to use
onie maner of witch-craftes, sorcerie, or necromancie,
nor give themselves furth to have onie sik craft or
knawledge thereof, their-throw abusand the people: Nor
that na persoun seik onie helpe, response, or
consultation at onie sik users or abusers foresaidis
of witch-craftes, sorceries, or necromancie, under the
paine of death, alsweill to be execute against the
user, abuser, as the seiker of the response or
consultation. And this to be put to execution be the
justice, schireffis, stewards, baillies, lords of
regalities, and royalties, their deputes, and uthers
or ordinar judges competent within this realme, with
all rigour, having power to execute the samin."
James VI. of Scotland and I. of England decreed that any one who
should use, practise, or exercise any invocation, or consult or
covenant with, entertain or employ, feed, or reward any evil or wicked
spirit, to or for any purpose, or take up any dead body, should, on
being convicted thereof, suffer death.
The laws against witchcraft remained in force, and were executed with
severity, for a long time. During the continuance of the Long
Parliament alone, three thousand unhappy persons were sacrificed
because of their supposed connection with witchcraft. But by the Act 9
George II. cap. 5 it is ordained that no prosecution, suit, or
proceeding shall be commenced or carried on against any person for
witchcraft, sorcery, enchantment, or conjuration, nor shall any one
charge another with any such offence, in any court whatever. But if
any person shall pretend to exercise or use any kind of witchcraft,
sorcery, enchantment, or conjuration, or undertake to tell fortunes;
or pretend, from his skill or knowledge in any occult or crafty
science, to discover where or in what manner any goods supposed to
have been stolen or lost may be found: every person so offending,
being convicted on indictment or information, shall suffer
imprisonment for a year, and once in every quarter of the said year,
in some market town of the county, upon the market day there, stand
openly in the pillory for one hour, and also (if the court by which
such judgment shall be given shall think fit) be obliged to give
sureties for his good behaviour, in such sum, and for such time, as
the said court shall judge proper, according to the circumstances of
the offence, and in such case shall be further imprisoned until such
sureties shall be given.
Sir George M'Kenzie, the distinguished Scotch lawyer, thought there
was such a craft as witchcraft; and so did William Forbes, a member of
the Faculty of Advocates, a professor of law in the University of
Glasgow, and author of several works of considerable merit. The
following extracts from Forbes's _Institute of the Law of Scotland_
prove to some extent what was the legal creed in Scotland last century
in regard to witches:--
"Witchcraft is that black art whereby strange and
wonderful things are wrought by a power derived from
the devil. It goes under several names, taken from
particular effects and ways of its operation: As
those of magic, because it is a knowledge of more
than is lawful to be known; divination, from a
revealing of things past, present, or to come;
enchantment, from a working by charms or ceremonious
rites; sorcery, from the casting of lots to bring
hidden things to light; necromancy, from the calling
up and consulting the devil, in form of some dead
person; fascination, from the hurting creatures by
envious looks, and eye-biting, or by words, etc. Those
who practise this art are, in like manner, termed
witches, magicians, diviners, enchanters, sorcerers,
necromancers, fascinaters. Which names, given for
different causes to the devil's disciples, are, for
the most part, promiscuously used to signify any
person who, by covenant with Satan, and his
assistance, doth work strange things, because of the
affinity of all their operations, which have the same
general foundation and tendency.
"An express covenant is entered into betwixt a witch
and the devil appearing in some visible shape, whereby
the former renounces his God and baptism, engaging to
serve the devil, and do all the mischief he can, as
occasion offers, and leaves soul and body to his
disposal after death. The devil, on his part, articles
with such proselytes concerning the shape he is to
appear to them in, and the services they are to expect
from him, upon the performance of certain charms or
ceremonious rites. To some he gives certain spirits or
imps to correspond with, and serve them as their
familiars, known by them by some odd names, to which
they answer when called. These imps are said to be
kept in pots or other vessels that stink detestably.
This league is made verbally if the party cannot
write; and such as can write sign a written covenant
with their blood. On the meaner proselytes the devil
fixes, in some secret part of their bodies, a mark, as
his seal to know his own by, which is like a flea-bite
or blue spot, and sometimes resembles a little teat;
and the part so stamped doth ever after remain
insensible, and doth not bleed, though never so much
nipped, or pricked, by thrusting a pin, awl, or bodkin
into it. But if the covenanter be one of the better
rank, the devil only draws blood of the party, or
touches him or her in some part of the body, without
any visible mark remaining.
"A tacit covenant with Satan is understood to be
entered into by those who knowingly use the
superstitious rites or ceremonies observed by witches,
or unlawful means to bring anything about which they
know to be ineffectual in themselves without the
devil's concurrence.
"Witches used to be distinguished into good and bad
witches. The bad witch, commonly called the black
witch, or binding witch, is one who, by a league with
the devil, is assisted by him to work mischief. The
good witch is he or she who useth diabolical means to
do good--as to heal persons, loose or undo
enchantments, and to discover who are bewitched, and
by whom. But this term of a good witch is very
improper, for all who have commerce with Satan are
certainly bad.
"Some works of witches are really what they seem to
be; others are mere diabolical juggling, or a delusion
of the eyes of spectators with some strange sleight of
Satan. (To which last I may refer their imaginary
passing through shut doors, and transforming
themselves and others into the shape of cats, dogs,
hares, and other creatures.) Some of their actions
respect themselves, and their behaviour towards their
infernal master; such as their coming to appointed
meetings called their Sabbaths, where they pay homage
to him, and are taught to act all manner of
wickedness, and give an account of their horrid past
proceedings. Witches are chiefly employed in plain
mischief, by hurting persons or their goods, or by
bringing some actual evil or calamity upon them. But
they sometimes work mischief under a pretence or
colour of doing good--as when they cure diseases,
loose enchantments, and discover other witches. All
their designs are brought about by charms, or
ceremonious rites instituted by the devil, which are
in themselves of no efficacy, and serve only as
signals and watchwords to admonish Satan, as it were,
when, where, and upon whom to do mischief, or perform
cures, according to his compact with the witches."
"Under necromancy," says Mr. Forbes, "are comprehended
chiromancy, predictions, and responses by the sieve
and the shear, and all other hellish arts of
divination. It hath been sustained to bring in a
woman guilty of witchcraft, that she threatened to
do some mischief to a person who immediately or not
long after suffered a grievous harm in his body or
goods, by sorcery or witchcraft, without any apparent
or natural cause, though the manner or enchantment
used to work such mischief was not particularly
expressed, and the threat was only general, and did
not specify the ill turn to be done, in respect the
means used by witches are best known to themselves.
Some relevant articles of witchcraft are founded upon
events having no necessary dependence on the means
used by the person accused: as that a man on whom
a woman had laid a grievous sickness by her sorcery
was relieved thereof by her taking him by the hand,
and the moving of her lips; or that a woman came
several times into a house when the doors and
windows were all fast locked and shut at night,
combed her hair the last night, and laid her hand
upon a nurse's breast, upon which a child then
sucking her died within half-an-hour--because
injuries done by witches are not occasioned by
any inherent virtue or efficacy in the means used
by them, but only by the devil's influence; and that
there is no natural cause for the mischief done, is
the reason of ascribing it to witchcraft. Where one
is indicted for being in league with the devil, and
exercising acts of witchcraft, it sufficeth to prove
that the indictee was in confederacy with that evil
spirit, and did such things; but in the trial of one
indicted for bewitching any person, two things are to
be proved, viz. that such a person is bewitched, and
that the indictee is the witch."
Mr. Forbes says that symptoms of witchcraft are: "When
learned and skilful physicians find the patient's
trouble doth not proceed from any bodily distemper or
natural causes; when he is exceedingly tormented at
the saying of prayers and graces, or reading of the
Bible; when in his fits he tells truly many things
past and future, which in an ordinary way he could not
know; and when things are done with respect to him by
some invisible hand working in a manner that cannot be
understood. Other proofs are such as when one cannot
shed tears, and cannot say the Lord's Prayer. And
other presumptions," he proceeds, "are inferred from
the drawing of blood of the suspected person, or the
putting of something under a threshold where he or she
goes in, or under a stool where the suspected person
sits, or causes him or her to come into a room where
those afflicted with witchcraft are, and touch them;
or trying if the suspected person will sink or swim
when put tied into the water; the burning of cakes
wherein are the afflicted persons' urine, or the
burning of clothes in which such persons lie."
The learned professor thought that witchcraft might be proved by
witnesses who have heard the accused person invoking the devil for
help, or seen the suspected party entertaining a familiar spirit and
feeding it in any form or likeness, conjuring to raise storms, showing
in a glass or show-stone the faces of absent persons. His opinion was
that it was competent to receive as evidence the dying testimonies of
penitent witches concerning others informed against by them, as proof
of witchcraft was difficult to obtain; and the more secret
acts--meeting of witches in the night-time to adore their infernal
master, and hatch their mischievous projects when other people are
asleep, or when they themselves are invisible--cannot be otherwise
proved than by such as are privy thereto.
Sir Matthew Hale, the astute lawyer and judge, was a believer in
witchcraft, and entertained views on this subject similar to those of
Mr. Forbes, as will appear from the following particulars of the trial
of Rose Cullender and Ann Duny in 1664. These women were accused
before Sir Matthew Hale of various acts of witchcraft--such as
tormenting children by means of devilish devices, upsetting carts,
killing horses, breeding vermin, etc., through diabolical means. At
the trial, evidence was given by Anne Durent, that William Durent, her
son (one of the children bewitched) had strange and sad fits, caused
by Duny giving the child suck. A wise man (Dr. Jacob) advised her to
hang up the child's blanket in the chimney corner all day, and at
night, when she went to put the child to bed, if she found anything in
the blanket, to throw the thing, whether apparently animate or
inanimate, into the fire. The blanket was hung up and shaken according
to instructions, when, behold, a large toad fell on the hearth-stone.
The creature was thrown into the fire, and exploded like a gun. Next
day a friend of Duny's told deponent that a certain old woman was
severely burned. On hearing this, deponent went to the old woman's
house, and found her grievously scorched. Duny (for it was she who was
in this sad condition) told the witness, that because of the evil she
did to her, she (Duny) would see much evil befall the Durent family.
Deponent further stated that her daughter, Elizabeth Durent, about ten
years of age, was afflicted like her other child, and in her fits
complained of Ann Duny tormenting her. Duny had (so said the witness)
predicted that the child named would not live long, and within three
days the child died. Deponent also testified that Duny had, while in a
rage, said that she (the witness) would yet be going with crutches--a
prophecy followed by deponent becoming so lame in both her legs, that
she could not walk without being supported by sticks. "And, indeed,"
said she, exhibiting a pair of crutches in the witness-box, "I could
not come into court without them."
After lengthened and curious evidence touching the charges against the
prisoners for bewitching the children, named in the indictment, Dr.
Brown, a gentleman of great learning, expressed his opinion that the
children were bewitched. He said that in Denmark there had been a
great discovery of witches, who used the very same way of afflicting
people, viz. by conveying pins and nails into them in a mysterious
way. His opinion was that the devil, in witchcraft, did work upon the
bodies of men and women, and afflict them with such distempers as
their bodies were most subject to.
John Sloan testified that, while bringing home three carts of hay, one
of the carts accidentally damaged the window of Rose Cullender's
house, and that she, in consequence of this mishap, uttered violent
threats against him. The other two carts passed her house safely
several times that day, but the cart which damaged the window was two
or three times overturned. Once, when taking the unlucky vehicle
through a gate, it stuck fast, though nothing could be seen that
prevented it from being drawn along easily. After great trouble, the
cart was brought home, but, there again, fresh difficulties had to be
encountered: the vehicle could not be taken to the place where it was
intended to be unloaded; and, what most frightened the witness and
those aiding him was, that every one who approached the cart to render
any assistance on that eventful day, came away with his nose bleeding.
Robert Sherringhame swore that Rose Cullender, taking offence at him,
threatened him and his horses with injury, and in a short time many of
his horses and cattle died. Following these misfortunes, he became
lame, and was so tormented with lice that he could not get them
removed until he burned two suits of clothes.
Richard Spencer testified that he had heard Ann Duny say that the
devil would not let her rest until she took her revenge upon Cornelius
Sandswell.
The judge told the jury that they were to inquire, first, whether the
several acts of witchcraft mentioned in the indictment had been
committed; and, secondly, if they had, it was for them to say whether
the prisoners were the guilty persons. The jurors, he said, could not
doubt that there were such creatures as witches; for history affirmed
it, and the wisdom of all nations had provided laws against such
persons. He prayed that the hearts of the jury might be directed in
the mighty thing they had in hand; for to condemn the innocent and let
the guilty go free were alike an abomination. The jury brought in a
verdict of guilty. The judge then passed sentence of death against the
culprits, and they were executed.
A general belief in the existence of witches prevailed in every
country, and stringent measures were adopted for their extirpation. If
the punishment of witchcraft was not at first countenanced by the
Church, the clergy subsequently, and for centuries, played a prominent
part in the detection and condemnation of the so-called witches. Pope
John stated in a bull of 1317 that several of his courtiers and his
physician had given themselves up to superstition, and that their
rings and mirrors contained evil spirits. Pope Innocent VIII. issued a
bull against witchcraft in 1484. Thousands of innocent persons were
burned, and others killed by the tests applied to them. Twenty-seven
articles were issued in France in the fourteenth century against
sorcery, the use of images, and the invocation of evil spirits. Many
Templars were burned in Paris for witchcraft in 1309.
Referring to witches and sorcerers, Bishop Jewell, when preaching
before his sovereign in 1598, said: "Witches and sorcerers, within the
last four years, are marvellously increased within your Grace's realm.
Your Grace's subjects pine away, even unto the death; their colour
fadeth--their flesh rotteth--their speech is benumbed--their senses
are bereft. I pray they may never practise further than upon your
Majesty's subjects." Mr. Glanvil, chaplain to Charles II., was of
opinion that "the disbeliever in witchcraft must believe the devil
gratis;" and Wesley said that "giving up witchcraft was, in fact,
giving up the Bible." The learned Lord Bacon, Lord Coke, and twelve
bishops had a voice in the legislation of the country when the act of
James I. of England against witchcraft became law.
Five hundred witches were burned at Geneva during three months of
1515. In the diocese of Como, one thousand were burned within one
year. Nine hundred were burned in Lorraine in a period of fifteen
years. Hundreds perished at Wurzburg in a few years; and upwards of
one hundred thousand were executed in Germany, for which country the
_malleus maleficarum_, or hammer for witches (drawn out by a clergyman
and two inquisitors appointed by Innocent VIII.), was principally
intended. In Poland and America, witches, or supposed witches, were
also put to death by fire and water. Persecutions against witches
raged with great fury in America in 1648-49. In New England, in 1692,
nine persons were hanged by the Puritans for witchcraft. Under
pressure, fifty persons there confessed themselves to be witches.
Italy, Spain, and Portugal had their victims too. At one period the
execution of witches exceeded those in England, though the number put
to death in the latter country was truly appalling. In 1646 two
hundred persons were tried and executed for witchcraft at the Sussex
and Essex assizes. The last persons put to death for witchcraft in
England were, some say, in 1664, while others assert the last victims
suffered in 1682. The latest instance of a witch being executed in
Scotland was in 1722, when the supposed offender was burned at Loth,
or Dornoch, Sutherlandshire, by order of the sheriff of that county.
In more recent times than several of the dates to which we have
referred, discoveries, which might have been easily understood, gave
rise to the supposition that the actors were in compact with the
devil. On the first occasion of the German printers carrying their
books to France, the ingenious inventors of printing were condemned to
be burned alive as sorcerers--a sentence that would have been executed
had those discoverers of a useful art not saved themselves by flight.
Reginald Scot, taking an enlightened view of superstition, says, "The
fables of witchcraft have taken so fast hold of and deep root in the
heart of man, that few endure the hand of correction without
attributing the chastisement to the influence of witches. Such
superstitious people," he says, "are persuaded that neither hail nor
snow, thunder nor lightning, rain nor tempestuous winds, come from the
higher powers, but are raised by the power of witches and conjurors.
If a clap of thunder or a gale of wind be heard, the timid people ring
bells, cry out to burn the witches, or else they burn consecrated
things, hoping thereby to drive the devil out of the air."
Mr. E. Chambers did not think the art of witchcraft was carried on by
or through intercourse with the devil or spirits (though he did not
dispute there were such beings), but by or through philosophical
means, altogether different from the operations supposed necessary to
enable witches and wizards to perform actions not easily comprehended
by the uninitiated.