PART II., QUESTION I.
CHAPTER XIIOf the Way how in Particular they Afflict Men with Other Like Infirmities.
But who can reckon the number of
infirmities which they have inflicted upon men, such as blindness, the
sharpest pains, and contortions of the body? Yet we shall set down a few
examples which we have seen with our eyes, or have been related to one of us
Inquisitors.
When an inquisition was being held
on some witches in the town of Innsbruck, the following case, among others,
was brought to light. A certain honest woman who had been legally married to
one of the household of the Archduke formally deposed the following. In the
time of her maidenhood she had been in the service of one of the citizens,
whose wife became afflicted with grievous pains in the head; and a woman came
who said she could cure her, and so began certain incantations and rites which
she said would assuage the pains. And I carefully watched (said this woman)
what she did, and saw that, against the nature of water poured into a vase,
she caused water to rise in its vessel, together with other ceremonies which
there is no need to mention. And considering that the pains in my mistress'
head were not assuaged by these means, I addressed the witch in some
indignation with these words: “I do not know what you are doing, but
whatever it is, it is witchcraft, and you are doing it for your own profit.”
Then the witch at once replied: “You will know in three days whether I am a
witch or not.” And so it proved; for on the third day when I sat down and
took up a spindle, I suddenly felt a terrible pain in my body. First it was
inside me, so that it seemed that there was no part of my body in which I did
not feel horrible shooting pains; then it seemed to me just as if burning
coals were being continually heaped upon my head; thirdly, from the crown of
my head to the soles of my feet there was no place large enough for a pinprick
that was not covered with a rash of white pustules; and so I remained in these
pains, crying out and wishing only for death, until the fourth day. At last my
mistress' husband told me to go to a certain tavern; and with great difficulty
I went, whilst he walked before, until we were in front of the tavern. “See!”
he said to me; “there is a loaf of white bread over the tavern door.” “I
see,” said I. Then he said: “Take it down, if you possibly can, for it may
do you good.” And I, holding on to the door with one hand as much as I could,
got hold of the loaf with the other. “Open it” (said my master) “and
look carefully at what is inside.” Then, when I had broken open the loaf, I
found many things inside it, especially some white grains very like the
pustules on my body; and I saw also some seeds and herbs such as I could not
eat or even look at, with the bones of serpents and other animals. In my
astonishment I asked my master what was to be done; and he told me to throw it
all into the fire. I did so; and behold! suddenly, not in an hour or even a
few minutes, but at the moment when that matter was thrown into the fire, I
regained all my former health.
And much more was deposed against
the wife of the citizen in whose service this woman had been, by reason of
which she was not lightly but very strongly suspected, and especially because
she had used great familiarity with known witches. It is presumed that, having
knowledge of the spell of witchcraft hidden in the loaf, she had told it to
her husband; and then, in the way described, the maid-servant recovered her
health.
To bring so great a crime into
detestation, it is well that we should tell how another person, also a woman,
was bewitched in the same town. An honest married woman deposed the following
an oath.
Behind my house (she said) I have a
greenhouse, and my neighbour's garden borders on it. One day I noticed that a
passage had been made from my neighbour's garden to my greenhouse, not without
some damage being cause; and as I was standing in the door of my greenhouse
reckoning to myself and bemoaning both the passage and the damage, my
neighbour suddenly came up and asked if I suspected her. But I was frightened
because of her bad reputation, and only answered, “The footprints on the
grass are proof of the damage.” Then she was indignant because I had not, as
she hoped, accused her with the actionable words, and went away murmuring; and
though I could hear her words, I could not understand them. After a few days I
became very ill with pains in the stomach, and the sharpest twinges shooting
from my left side to my right, and conversely, as if two swords or knives were
thrust through my breast; whence day and night I disturbed all the neighbours
with my cries. And when they came from all sides to console me, it happened
that a certain clay-worker, who was engaged in an adulterous intrigue with the
witch, my neighbour, coming to visit me, took pity on my illness, and after a
few words of comfort went away. But the next day he returned in a hurry, and,
after consoling me, added: “I am going to test whether your illness is due
to witchcraft, and if I find that it is, I shall restore your health.” So he
took some molten lead and, while I was lying in bed, poured it into a bowl of
water which he placed on my body. And when the lead solidified into a certain
image and various shapes, he said: “See! your illness has been caused by
witchcraft; and one of the instruments of that witchcraft is hidden under the
threshold of your house door. Let us go, then, and remove it, and you will
feel better.” So my husband and he went to remove the charm; and the
clay-worker, taking up the threshold, told my husband to put his hand into the
hold which then appeared, and take out whatever he found; and he did so. And
first he brought out a waxen image about a palm long, perforated all over, and
pierced through the sides with two needles, just in the same way that I felt
the stabbing pains from side to side; and then little bags containing all
sorts of things, such as grains and seeds and bones. And when all these things
were burned, I became better, but not entirely well. For although the
shootings and twinges stopped, and I quite regained my appetite for food, yet
even now I am by no means fully restored to health. — And when we asked her
why it was that she had not been completely restored, she answered: There are
some other instruments of witchcraft hidden away which I cannot find. And when
I asked the man how he knew where the first instruments were hidden, he
answered: “I knew this through the love which prompts a friend to tell
things to a friend; for your neighbour revealed this to me when she was
coaxing me to commit adultery with her.” This is the story of the sick
woman.
But if I were to tell all the
instances that were found in that one town I should need to make a book of
them. For countless men and women who were blind, or lame, or withered, or
plagued with various infirmities, severally took their oath that they had
strong suspicions that their illnesses, both in general and in particular,
were caused by witches, and that they were bound to endure those ills either
for a period or right up to their deaths. And all that they said and testified
was true, either as regards a specified illness or as regards a specified
illness or as regards the death of others. For that country abounds in
henchmen and knights who have leisure for vice, and seduce women, and then
wish to cast them off when they desire to marry an honest woman. But they can
rarely do this without incurring the vengeance of some witchcraft upon
themselves or their wives. For when those women see themselves despised, they
persist in tormenting not so much the husband as the wife, in the fond hope
that, if the wife should die, the husband would return to his former mistress.
For when a cook of the Archduke had
married an honest girl from a foreign country, a witch, who had been his
mistress, met them in the public road and, in the hearing of other honest
people, foretold the bewitching and death of the girl, stretching out her hand
and saying: “Not for long will you rejoice in your husband.” And at once,
on the following day, she took to her bed, and after a few days paid the debt
of all flesh, exclaiming just as she expired: Lo! thus I die, because that
woman, with God's permission, has killed me by her witchcraft; yet verily I go
to another and better marriage with God.
In the same way, according to the
evidence of public report, a certain soldier was slain by witchcraft, and many
others whom I omit to mention.
But among them there was a
well-known gentleman, whom his mistress wished to come to her on one occasion
to pass the night; but he sent his servant to tell her that he could not visit
her that night because he was busy. She promptly flew into a rage, and said to
the servant: Go and tell your master that he will not trouble me for long. On
the very next day he was taken ill, and he was buried within a week.
And there are witches who can
bewitch their judges by a mere look or glance from their eyes, and publicly
boast that they cannot be punished; and when malefactors have been imprisoned
for their crimes, and exposed to the severest torture to make them tell the
truth, these witches can endow them with such an obstinacy of preserving
silence that they are unable to lay bare their crimes.
And there are some who, in order to
accomplish their evil charms and spells, beat and stab the Crucifix, and utter
the filthiest words against the Purity of the Most Glorious Virgin MARY,
casting the foulest aspersions on the Nativity of Our Saviour from Her
inviolate womb. It is not expedient to repeat those vile words, nor yet to
describe their detestable crimes, as the narrative would give too great
offence to the ears of the pious; but they are all kept and preserved in
writing, detailing the manner in which a certain baptized Jewess had
instructed other young girls. And one of them, named Walpurgis, being in the
same year at the point of death, and being urged by those who stood round her
to confess her sins, exclaimed: I have given myself body and soul to the devil;
there is no hope of forgiveness for me; and so died.
These particulars have not been
written to the shame, but rather to the praise and glory of the most
illustrious Archduke. For he was truly a Catholic Prince, and laboured very
zealously with the Church at Brixen to exterminate witches. But they are
written rather in hate and loathing of so great a crime, and that men may not
cease to avenge their wrongs, and the insults and offences these wretches
offer to the Creator and our Holy Faith, to say nothing of the temporal losses
which they cause. For this is their greatest and gravest crime, namely, that
they abjure the Faith.