PART II.
QUESTION I. CHAPTER IOf the several Methods by which Devils through Witches Entice and Allure the
Innocent to the Increase of that Horrid Craft and Company.
There are three methods above all
by which devils, through the agency of witches, subvert the innocent, and by
which that perfidy is continually being increased. And the first is through
weariness, through inflicting grievous losses in their temporal possessions.
For, as S. Gregory says: The devil often tempts us to give way from very
weariness. And it is to be understood that it is within the power of a man to
resist such temptation; but that God permits it as a warning to us not to give
way to sloth. And in this sense is Judges ii to be understood, where it
says that God did not destroy those nations, that through them He might prove
the people of Israel; and it speaks of the neighbouring nations of the
Canaanites, Jebusites, and others. And in our time the Hussites and other
Heretics are permitted, so that they cannot be destroyed. Devils, therefore,
by means of witches, so afflict their innocent neighbours with temporal losses,
that they are to beg the suffrages of witches, and at length to submit
themselves to their counsels; as many experiences have taught us.
We know a stranger in the diocese
of Augsburg, who before he was forty-four years old lost all his horses in
succession through witchcraft. His wife, being afflicted with weariness by
reason of this, consulted with witches, and after following their counsels,
unwholesome as they were, all the horses which he bought after that (for he
was a carrier) were preserved from witchcraft.
And how many women have complained
to us in our capacity of Inquisitors, that when their cows have been injured
by being deprived of their milk, or in any other way, they have consulted with
suspected witches, and even been given remedies by them, on condition that
they would promise something to some spirit; and when they asked what they
would have to promise, the witches answered that it was only a small thing,
that they should agree to execute the instructions of that master with regard
to certain observances during the Holy Offices of the Church, or to observe
some silent reservations in their confessions to priests.
Here it is to be noted that, as has
already been hinted, this iniquity has small and scant beginnings, as that of
the time of the elevation of the Body of Christ they spit on the ground, or
shut their eyes, or mutter some vain words. We know a woman who yet lives,
protected by the secular law, who, when the priest at the celebration of the
Mass blesses the people, saying, Dominus uobiscum, always adds to
herself these words in the vulgar tongue “Kehr mir die Zung im Arss umb.”
Or they even say some such thing at confession after they have received
absolution, or do not confess everything, especially mortal sins, and so by
slow degrees are led to a total abnegation of the Faith, and to the abominable
profession of sacrilege.
This, or something like it, is the
method which witches use towards honest matrons who are little given to carnal
vices but concerned for worldly profit. But towards young girls, more given to
bodily lusts and pleasures, they observe a different method, working through
their carnal desires and the pleasures of the flesh.
Here it is to be noted that the
devil is more eager and keen to tempt the good than the wicked, although in
actual practice he tempts the wicked more than the good, because more aptitude
for being tempted is found in the wicked than in the good. Therefore the devil
tries all the harder to seduce all the more saintly virgins and girls; and
there is reason in this, besides many examples of it.
For since he already possesses the
wicked, but not the good, he tries the harder to seduce into his power the
good whom he does not, than the wicked whom he does, possess. Similarly any
earthly prince takes up arms against those who do not acknowledge his rule
rather than those who do not oppose him.
And here is an example. Two witches
were burned in Ratisbon, as we shall tell later where we treat of their
methods of raising tempests. And one of them, who was a bath-woman, had
confessed among other things the following: that she had suffered much injury
from the devil for this reason. There was a certain devout virgin, the
daughter of a very rich man whom there is no need to name, since the girl is
now dead in the disposition of Divine mercy, and we would not that his thought
should be perverted by evil; and the witch was ordered to seduce her by
inviting her to her house on some Feast Day, in order that the devil himself,
in the form of a young man, might speak with her. And although she had tried
very often to accomplish this, yet whenever she had spoken to the young girl,
she had protected herself with the sign of the Holy Cross. And no one can
doubt that she did this at the instigation of a holy Angel, to repel the works
of the devil.
Another virgin living in the
diocese of Strasburg confessed to one of us that she was alone on a certain
Sunday in her father's house, when an old woman of that town came to visit
here and, among other scurrilous words, made the following proposition; that,
if she liked, she would take her to a place where there were some young men
unknown to all the townsmen. And when, said the virgin, I consented, and
followed her to her house, the old woman said, “See, we go upstairs to an
upper room where the young men are; but take care not to make the sign of the
Cross.” I gave her my promise not to do so, and as she was going up before
me and I was going up the stairs, I secretly crossed myself. At the top of the
stairs, when we were both standing outside the room, the hag turned angrily
upon me with a horrible countenance, and looking at me said, “Curse you! Why
did you cross yourself? Go away from here. Depart in the name of the devil.”
And so I returned unharmed to my home.
It can be seen from this how
craftily that old enemy labours in the seduction of souls. For it was in this
way that the bath-woman whom we have mentioned, and who was burned, confessed
that she had been seduced by some old women. A different method, however, was
used in the case of her companion witch, who had met the devil in human form
on the road while she herself was going to visit her lover for the purpose of
fornication. And when the Incubus devil had seen her, and has asked her
whether she recognized him, and she had said that she did not, he had answered"
“I am the devil; and if you wish, I will always be ready at your pleasure,
and will not fail you in any necessity.” And when she had consented, she
continued for eighteen years, up to the end of her life, to practise
diabolical filthiness with him, together with a total abnegation of the Faith
as a necessary condition.
There is also a third method of
temptation through the way of sadness and poverty. For when girls have been
corrupted, and have been scorned by their lovers after they have immodestly
copulated with them in the hope and promise of marriage with them, and have
found themselves disappointed in all their hopes and everywhere despised, they
turn to the help and protection of devils; either for the sake of vengeance by
bewitching those lovers or the wives they have married, or for the sake of
giving themselves up to every sort of lechery. Alas! experience tells us that
there is no number to such girls, and consequently the witches that spring
from this class are innumerable. Let us give a few out of many examples.
There is a place in the diocese of
Brixen where a young man deposed the following facts concerning the
bewitchment of his wife.
“In the time of my youth I loved
a girl who importuned me to marry her; but I refused her and married another
girl from another country. But wishing for friendship's sake to please her, I
invited her to the wedding. She came, and while the other honest women were
wishing us luck and offering gifts, she raised her hand and, in the hearing of
the other women who were standing round, said, You will have few days of
health after to-day. My bride was frightened, since she did not know her (for,
as I have said, I had married her from another country), and asked the
bystanders who she was who had threatened her in that way; and they said that
she was a loose and vagrom woman. None the less, it happened just as she had
said. For after a few days my wife was so bewitched that she lost the use of
all her limbs, and even now, after ten years, the effects of witchcraft can be
seen on her body.”
If we were to collect all the
similar instances which have occurred in one town of that diocese, it would
take a whole book; but they are written and preserved at the house of the
Bishop of Brixen, who still lives to testify to their truth, astounding and
unheard-of though they are.
But we must not pass over in
silence one unheard-of and astonishing instance. A certain high-born Count in
the ward of Westerich, in the diocese of Strasburg, married a noble girl of
equal birth; but after he had celebrated the wedding, he was for three years
unable to know her carnally, on account, as the event proved, of a certain
charm which prevented him. In great anxiety, and not knowing what to do, he
called loudly on the Saints of God. It happened that he went to the State of
Metz to negotiate some business; and while he was talking about the streets
and squares of the city, attended by his servants and domiciles, he met a
certain women who had formerly been his mistress. Seeing her, and not at all
thinking of the spell that was on him, he spontaneously addressed her kindly
for the sake of their old friendship, asking her how she did, and whether she
was well. And she, seeing the Count's gentleness, in her turn asked very
particularly after his health and affairs; and when he answered that he was
well, and that everything prospered with him, she was astonished and was
silent for a time. The Count, seeing her thus astonished, again spoke kindly
to her, inviting her to converse with him. So she inquired after his wife, and
received a similar reply, that she was in all respects well. Then she asked if
he had any children; and the Count said he had three sons, one born in each
year. At that she was more astonished, and was again silent for a while. And
the Count asked her, Why, my dear, do you make such careful inquiries? I am
sure that you congratulate my on my happiness. Then she answered, Certainly I
congratulate you; but curse that old woman who said she would bewitch your
body so that you could not have connexion with your wife! And in proof of this,
there is a pot in the well in the middle of your yard containing certain
objects evilly bewitched, and this was placed there in order that, as long as
its contents were preserved intact, for so long you would be unable to cohabit.
But see! it is all in vain, and I am glad, etc. On his return home the Count
did not delay to have the well drained; and, finding the pot, burned its
contents and all, whereupon he immediately recovered the virility which he had
lost. Wherefore the Countess again invited all the nobility to a fresh wedding
celebration, saying that she was now the Lady of that castle and estate, after
having for so long remained a virgin. For the sake of the Count's reputation
it is not expedient to name that castle and estate; but we have related this
story in order that the truth of the matter may be known, to bring so great a
crime into open detestation.
From this it is clear that witches
use various methods to increase their numbers. For the above-mentioned woman,
because she had been supplanted by the Count's wife, case that spell upon the
Count with the help of another witches; and this is how one witchcraft brings
innumerable others in its train.