WITCHCRAFT, a supernatural power of which persons were formerly supposed to obtain the possession by entering into a compact with the devil. They gave themselves up to him body and soul; and he engaged that they should want for nothing, and that he would avenge them upon all their enemies. As soon as the bargain was concluded, the devil delivered to the witch an imp, or familiar spirit, to be ready at a call, and do whatever it was directed. By the assistance of this imp and the devil together, the witch, who was almost always an old woman, was enabled to transport herself in the air on a broomstick or a spit to distant places to attend the meetings of the witches. At these meetings the devil always presided. They were also enabled to transform themselves into various shapes, particularly to assume the forms of cats and hares, in which they most delighted; to inflict diseases on whomsoever they thought proper, and to punish their enemies in a variety of ways.

The belief that certain persons were endowed with supernatural power, and that they were assisted by invisible spirits, is very ancient. The sagoe of the Romans seem rather to have been sorcerers than witches; and indeed the idea of a witch, as above described, could not have been prevalent till after the propagation of Christianity, as the heathens had no knowledge of the Christian devil. Witchcraft was universally believed in Europe till the sixteenth century, and even maintained its ground with tolerable firmness till the middle of the seventeenth. Vast numbers of reputed witches were convicted and condemned to be burnt every year. The methods of discovering them were various. One was, to weigh the supposed criminal against the church Bible, which, if she was guilty, would preponderate: another, by making her attempt to say the Lord’s Prayer. This no witch was able to repeat entirely, but would omit some part or sentence of it. It is remarkable, that all witches did not hesitate at the same place, some leaving out one part, and some another. Teats, through which the imps sucked, were indubitable marks of a witch: these were always raw, and also insensible, and if squeezed, sometimes yielded a drop of blood. A witch could not weep more than three tears, and that only out of the left eye. This want of tears was, by the witch-finders, and even by some judges, considered as a very substantial proof of guilt. Swimming a witch was another kind of popular ordeal generally practised. For this she was stripped naked, and cross-bound, the right thumb to the left toe, and the left thumb to the right toe. Thus prepared, she was thrown into a pond or river, in which, if guilty, she could not sink; for having, by her compact with the devil, renounced the benefit of the water of baptism, that element, in its turn, renounced her, and refused to receive her into its bosom. Sir Robert Filmer mentions two others by fire: the first, by burning the thatch of the house of the suspected witch; the other, burning any animal supposed to be bewitched by her, as a hog or ox. These, it was held, would force a witch to confess. The trial by the stool was another method used for the discovery of witches. It was thus managed: having taken the suspected witch, she was placed in the middle of a room upon a stool or table, cross-legged, or in some other uneasy posture; to which, if she submitted not, she was then bound with cords; there she was watched, and kept without meat or sleep for the space of twenty-four hours; for, they said, within that time they should see her imp come and suck. A little hole was likewise made in the door for imps to come in at; and lest it should come in some less discernible shape, they that watched were taught to be ever and anon sweeping the room, and if they saw any spiders or flies, to kill them: if they could not kill them, then they might be sure they were imps. If witches, under examination or torture, would not confess, all their apparel was changed, and every hair of their body shaven off with a sharp razor, lest they should secrete magical charms to prevent their confessing. Witches were most apt to confess on Friday. By such trials as these, and by the accusation of children, old women, and fools, were thousands of unhappy women condemned for witchcraft, and burnt at the stake.

For a considerable time after the inquisition was erected, the trials of witches, as heretics, were confined to that tribunal; but the goods of those who were condemned being confiscated to the holy office, its ministers were so active in discovering sorcerers, that the different governments found it necessary to deprive them of the cognizance of this crime. On the continent, commissioners were then appointed for the discovery and conviction of witches, who, though less active than the inquisitors, were but too zealous in prosecuting their function. In 1494, Sprenger and institor, two persons employed in this commission, published a collection of trials, most of which had come before themselves, under the title of Malleus Maleficarum. This served as a kind of institute for their successors.

∣ The first writers against witchcraft were stigmatized as atheists, though they only endeavoured to prove the imbecility of the persons accused, and the infatuation or the knavery of their accusers. Such were the epithets bestowed by Dr More. Wierus, the disciple of the celebrated Agrippa, gave rise to the first great controversy on this subject. His master had taught him humanity; and he endeavoured, but with too feeble a hand, to stop the bloody proceedings of the judges. Wierus appears to have been a well-disposed, weak man, with extensive reading on this subject, but too narrow-minded to comprehend it thoroughly. He involved himself in unspeakable difficulties, by admitting the action of supernatural powers in certain diseases, and in possessions, while he denied that witches had any concurrence in them. These appearances, said he, are illusions of the devil, who persuades simple and melancholy persons that the mischief he himself performs is done by them, and at their pleasure. He was weak enough to attempt the explanation of every story alleged by his antagonists, without questioning the truth of the facts.

Bodin, a French lawyer of eminence, who had assisted at several trials of witches, wrote against Wierus, in his Demonomania. He urged the concurrent testimonies of sufficient witnesses, and the confessions of the witches themselves, to establish the existence of sorcery. Wierus owned that the unhappy persons believed themselves to be guilty of the crimes alleged against them, but that they were deceived by the devil. But what do you make of the witches’ meetings, cried Bodin? The witches, replied his antagonist, are atrabilious. This explanation was so unsatisfactory, that Wierus passed for a magician, whom the devil had furnished with specious arguments to save others from punishment. Lerchemer,Godelmann, Ewichius, Ewal-dus, and some others, followed him, notwithstanding this stigma; but they were opposed by men of more acuteness and consistency than themselves; by Remigius, who had condemned several hundreds of sorcerers to the flames; Delrio, whose book is a complete Corpus Magiae; Cujacius, Erastus, Scribonius, Camerarius, and a crowd of others.

In this country, while the belief in witchcraft was supported by royal authority (for James I. is universally known to have written on demonology), countenanced by Bacon, and generally adopted among the people, only one writer was hardy enough to oppose it. This was Reginald Scot, who published a collection of impostures detected, under the title of “Discoveries of Witchcraft.” James ordered the book to be burnt by the common executioner, and the judges continued to burn witches as usual. During the civil wars, upwards of eighty were hanged in Suffolk, on [7:21:908]the accusations of Hopkins the witch-finder. Webster was the next writer against witchcraft, but he had a different fate from that of Scot, for most of his arguments were refuted by Glanville. This very acute writer was induced to publish his Philosophical Considerations about Witchcraft, by the apprehension that the increasing disbelief of witches and apparitions tended to affect the evidences of religion, and even of a Deity. In respect of argument he was certainly superior to his adversaries; his reasoning is perspicuous, though sometimes subtile, placed on the most specious foundations of evidence, and arranged with great skill.

On the continent, this controversy seemed almost forgotten, till Bekker published his Monde Enchantée., in which he denied the existence of witches, on the Cartesian principle that the Deity is the source of all action, consequently actions so opposite to his nature and attributes cannot be supposed to exist. He was answered by Frederick Hoffmann, the father of the modern theory and practice of medicine, in his dissertation De Diaboli Potentia in Corpora.

The latest witchcraft phrensy was in New England about the year 1692, when the execution of witches became a calamity more dreadful than the sword or the pestilence. The accusers became so daring, that neither civil nor religious authority would have proved a security against their attacks, if all the prosecutions had not been suddenly dropped, and the prisoners set at liberty. So far did those wretches proceed in absurdity, that a dog was accused of throwing persons into fits by looking at them. As soon as the prosecutions were stopped, all reports of witchcraft ceased.

It would be ridiculous to attempt a serious refutation of the existence of witches; and the task has long been unnecessary. In this country, at least, the discouragement long given to all suspicion of witchcraft, and the repeal of the statutes against that crime, have very much weakened, though perhaps they have not entirely eradicated, the persuasion. On the continent, too, it is evidently on the decline; and notwithstanding the exertions of Dr de Haen, and of the celebrated Lavater, we have little doubt that in a short time posterity will everywhere wonder at the credulity of their ancestors. That there ever were witches, is an opinion which cannot for a moment be admitted by a thinking man. The actions imputed to them were either absurd or impossible; the witnesses by whose evidence they were condemned, either weak enthusiasts or downright villains; and the confessions ascribed to the witches themselves, effects of a disordered imagination produced by cruel treatment and excessive watchings. As to the nightly meetings, demonologists themselves have been obliged to confess that they were nothing else but uneasy dreams, often produced by soporific compositions. The facts which have been brought forward by the advocates for witchcraft bear in their front the most evident marks of trick and imposture; and this has constantly been detected whenever these facts have been properly examined.