The True Story vs. Myth of Witchcraft. William Godwin
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All ill come running in, all good keepe out!
Hec. So, soe, enough: into the vessell with it.
There, ’t hath the true perfection: I am so light
At any mischief; there’s no villany
But is a tune methinkes.
Fire. A Tune! ’tis to the tune of dampnation then, I warrant
You that that song hath a villainous burthen.
Hec. Come my sweet sisters; let the aire strike our tune,
Whilst we show reverence to yond peeping moone.
Here they daunce. The Witches daunce and Ext.’
After this introduction to and instruction from the Devil, the novice has to do homage to her master. Still quoting Reginald Scot:
‘Sometimes their homage, with their oth and bargaine is receiued for a certeine number of yeares; sometimes for euer. Sometimes it consisteth in the deniall of the whole faith, sometimes in part. The first is, when the soule is absolutelie yeelded to the Diuell and hell fier; the other is, when they have but bargained to obserue certeine ceremonies and statutes of the Church; as to conceale faults at shrift, to fast on sundaies, &c. And this is doone, either by oth, protestation of words, or by obligation in writing, sometimes sealed with wax, sometimes signed with bloud, sometimes by kissing the Diuell’s bare buttocks; as did a Doctor called Edlin, who (as Bodin saith) was burned for witchcraft.
‘You must also understand, that after they have delicatlie banketted with the Diuell and the ladie of the fairies; and have eaten up a fat oxe, and emptied a butt of malmesie, and a binne of bread, at some nobleman’s house, in the dead of night, nothing is missed of all this in the morning. For the ladie Sibylla, Minerua, or Diana, with a golden rod striketh the vessell and the binne, and they are fullie replenished againe. Yea, she causeth the bullock’s bones to be brought and laid togither upon the hide, and lappeth the foure ends thereof togither, laieing her golden rod thereon; and then riseth up the bullocke againe, in his former estate and condition: and yet, at their returne home, they are like to starve for hunger; as Spineus saith. And this must be an infallible rule, that euerie fortnight, or at the least, euerie moneth, each witch must kill one child, at the least, for hir part.
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‘And this is to be noted, that the inquisitors affirme, that during the whole time of the witch’s excourse, the Diuell occupieth the roome and place of the witch, in so perfect a similitude, as hir husband in his bed, neither by feeling, speech, nor countenance can discerne hir from his wife. Yea, the wife departeth out of hir husbands armes insensiblie, and leaueth the Diuell in her roome visiblie.’
The novice is now a full-fledged witch, and according to the best authorities may, and must, commit certain crimes, of which the following are some:
‘They denie God, and all religion.
‘They cursse, blaspheme, and provoke God with all despite.
‘They give their faith to the diuell, and they worship and offer sacrifice to him.
‘They doo solemnelie vow and promise all their progenie unto the diuell.
‘They sacrifice their owne children to the diuell before baptisme, holding them up in the aire unto him, and then thrust a needle into their braines.
‘They burne their children when they have sacrificed them.
‘They sweare to the diuell to bring as manie into that societie, as they can.
‘They sweare by the name of the diuell.
‘They boile infants (after they have murthered them unbaptized) untill their flesh be made potable.
‘They eate the flesh and drinke the bloud of men and children openlie.
‘They kill men with poison.
‘They kill men’s Cattell.
‘They bewitch men’s corne, and bring hunger and barrennes into the countrie; they ride and flie in the aire, bring stormes, make tempests, &c.’
Scot, quoting Sprenger, gives yet a wider range to the wickedness of witches.31 ‘Although it be quite against the haire, and contrarie to the diuel’s will, contrarie to the witch’s oth, promise, and homage, and contrarie to all reason that witches should helpe anie thing that is bewitched; but rather set forward their Maister’s businesse; yet we read In Malleo Maleficarum, of three sorts of witches; and the same is affirmed by all the writers hereupon, new and old. One sort, they say, can hurt and not helpe, the second can helpe and not hurt, the third can both helpe and hurt. And, among the hurtful witches, he saith there is one sort more beastlie than any kind of beasts, saving woolues: for these usuallie deuoure and eate yong children and infants of their owne kind. These be they (saith he) that raise haile, tempests, and hurtfull weather; as lightening, thunder, &c. These be they that procure barrennesse in man, woman and beast. These can throwe children into waters, as they walke with their mothers, and not be seene. These can make horses kicke, till they cast their riders. These can so alter the mind of iudges, that they can haue no power to hurt them. These can procure to themselves and to others, taciturnitie and insensibilitie in their torments. These can bring trembling to the hands, and strike terror into the minds of them that apprehend them. These can manifest unto others, things hidden and lost, and foreshow things to come; and see them as though they were present. These can alter men’s minds to inordinate love or hate. These can kill whom they list, with lightening and thunder. These can take awaie man’s courage, and the power of generation. These can make a woman miscarrie in childbirth, and destroie the child in the mother’s wombe, without any sensible meanes either inwardlie or outwardlie applied. These can, with their looks, kill either man or beast.’
Chapter XII.
Familiar Spirits—Matthew Hopkins, the ‘Witch-finder’—Prince Rupert’s dog Boy—Unguents used for transporting Witches from Place to Place—Their Festivities at the Sabbat.
In order to enable the witch to carry out her benevolent intentions, the Devil supplied her with one or more familiar spirits, of which we shall hear much in the accounts of cases of witchcraft, and in this old English illustration we see the Devil presenting one to a young witch. They were of all kinds of shapes—perhaps the commonest was a cat or dog; but sometimes they took strange forms.
These familiars could talk and hold conversations with their mistresses, as witness the following story told by Giffard. A witch had confessed she had killed a man. ‘And upon the ladder she seemed very penitent, desiring all the world to forgive her. She sayd she had a spirit in the likeness of a yellow dun Cat. This Cat came unto her, as she sayd, as she sat by her fire, when she was fallen out with a neighbour of hers, and wished that the vengeance of God might light upon him and his. The Cat bad her not be afraid, she would do her no harme, she had served a dame five yeares in Kent, that was now dead, and if she would, she would be her servant. And whereas, sayd the Cat, such a man hath misused thee, if thou wilt I will plague him in his cattell. She sent the Cat, she killed three hogs and one Cow. The man, suspecting, burnt a pig alive, and, as she sayd, her Cat would never go thither any more. Afterward, she fell out with that Man; she sent her Cat, who told her, that she had given him that, which he should never recover; and, indeed, the man died.’32
In ‘The Lawes against Witches and Coniuration,’ etc., the attention of justices of the peace is thus directed to these familiar spirits:
‘1. These Witches have ordinarily a familiar, or spirit, which appeareth to them; sometimes in one shape, sometimes in another, as in the shape of a Man, Woman, Boy, Dogge, Cat, Foale, Fowle, Hare, Rat, Toad, etc. And