Casaubon for the suggestion he makes that Wier's intention "was not so much to favour women, as the Devil himself, with whom, it is to be feared, that he was too well acquainted. "50 This reminds us of what King James had already written of "Wierus, a German Physition," who "sets out a publike Apologie for all these craftes-folkes, whereby, procuring for their impunitie, he plainely bewrayes himselfe to have bene one of that profession."51

Reginald Scot's Discoverie of Witchcraft appeared in 1584. Scot, who was largely indebted to Wier, goes much farther than his Continental predecessor. Of course he does not deny the existence of evil spirits;52 but he does not believe, like Wier, that evil spirits are continually occupied in deluding mankind by all manner of false (or præstigious) appearances. Such deceits he ascribes to juggling, and he accordingly gives elaborate directions for the performance of various tricks of legerdemain.

53

There seems to be a more or less prevalent impression that Scot's book explodes witchcraft so thoroughly that the whole delusion might soon have come to an end in England if James I. had not mounted the throne a short time after it was published. True, King James's Dæmonologie is expressly directed "against the damnable opinions" of Wier and Scot.54 But, to tell the truth, Scot's treatise 50 The same, p. 46.

51 Dæmonologie, Workes, 1616, p. 92. On Wier in general, see Carl Binz, Doctor Johann Weyer, ein rheinischer Arzt, der erste Bekämpfer des Hexenwahns, Berlin, 1896.

52 He expressly asserts his belief in their existence (A Discourse upon Divels and Spirits, chap. 32, p. 540; cf. chap. 16, p. 514).

53 Discoverie of Witchcraft, xiii, 22-34, ed. 1584, pp. 321 ff., ed. 1665, pp. 181-201 (with cuts). Most of the tricks which Scot describes are identical with feats of legerdemain that are the stock in trade of every modern juggler:-"To throwe a peece of monie awaie, and to find it againe where you list" (p. 326); "To make a groat or a testor to sinke through a table, and to vanish out of a handkercher very strangelie" (p. 327); "How to deliver out foure aces, and to convert them into foure knaves" (p. 333); "To tell one without confederacie what card he thinketh” (p. 334); "To burne a thred, and to make it whole againe with the ashes thereof" (p. 341); "To cut off ones head, and to laie it in a platter, &c.: which the jugglers call the decollation of John Baptist" (p. 349). The picture of the apparatus required for the last-mentioned trick is very curious indeed (p. 353). The references to Scot, unless the contrary is stated, are to all the pages of the first (1584) edition, as reprinted by Dr. Brinsley Nicholson (London, 1886).

54 King James remarks, in the Preface to his Dæmonologie, that Scot "is not ashamed in publike Print to deny, that there can be such a thing as Witch-craft: and so maintaines the old errour of the Sadduces in denying of spirits" (Workes, 1616, pp. 91-92).

did not require a royal refutation. To us moderns, who are converted already and need no repentance, its general air of reasonableness, together with its humor and the raciness of the style, makes the Discoverie seem convincing enough. But this is to look at the matter from a mistaken point of view. The question is, not how Scot's arguments affect us, but how they were likely to affect his contemporaries. Now, if the truth must be told, the Discoverie is deficient in one very important respect. It makes no satisfactory answer to the insistent questions: "What are these evil spirits of which the Bible and the philosophers tell us, and which everybody believes in, and always has believed in, from the beginning of time? And what are they about? If they are powerful and malignant, why is it not likely that the effects which everybody ascribes to them are really their work? And if they are eager not only to torment but to seduce mankind, why is it not reasonable to suppose that they accomplish both ends at the same time-kill two birds with one stone-by procuring such evil effects by means of witches, or by allowing themselves to be utilized by witches as instruments of malice?" It was quite proper to ask these questions of Scot. He admitted the existence of evil spirits, but declared that we know little or nothing about them, denied that they can produce the phenomena then generally ascribed to their agency, and alleged fraud and delusion to account for such phenomena. Even to us, with our extraordinary and very modern incredulity toward supernatural occurrences, the lacuna in Scot's reasoning is clear enough if we only look at his argument as a whole. This we are not inclined to do; at least, no historian of witchcraft has ever done it. It is easier and more natural for us to accept such portions of Scot's argument as agree with our own view, to compliment him for his perspicacity, and to pass on, disregarding the inadequacy of what he says about evil spirits. Or, if we notice that his utterances on this topic are halting and uncertain, we are tempted to regard such hesitancy as further evidence of his rational temper. He could not quite deny the existence of devils, we feel,-that would

have been too much to expect of him; but he waves them aside like a sensible man." 55 A moment's consideration, however, will show us that this defect in Scot's case, trifling as it appears to us now-a-days, was in fact a very serious thing. To us, who never think of admitting the intervention of evil spirits in the affairs of this world, the question whether there are any such spirits at all has a purely theoretical interest. Indeed, we practically deny their existence when we ignore them as we do: de non apparentibus et non existentibus eadem est lex.-But to Scot's contemporaries, the question of the existence of evil spirits involved the whole matter in debate,-and Scot granted their existence.

56

A curious particular in the history of Scot's Discoverie should also be considered in estimating its effect on the seventeenth century. The appearance of a new edition in 1665, shortly after the famous Bury St. Edmunds case, may at first sight seem to indicate powerful and continuing influence on the part of the Discoverie. When we observe from the title-page, however, that the publisher has inserted nine chapters at the beginning of Book xv, and has added a second book to the Treatise on Divels and Spirits, our curiosity is excited. Investigation soon shows that these additions were calculated to destroy or minimize the total effect of Scot's book. The prefixed chapters contain directions for making magical circles, for calling up "the ghost of one that hath hanged himself," and for raising various orders of spirits. These chapters are thrust in without any attempt to indicate that they are not consistent with Scot's general plan and his theories. They appear to be, and are, practical directions for magic and necromancy. The additional book is even more dangerous to Scot's design. It is prefaced by the remark:-"Because the Author in his foregoing Treatise, upon the Nature of Spirits and Devils, hath only touched the subject thereof superficially, omitting the more material part; and with a brief and cursory Tractat,

55 In what an orderly way one may proceed from an admission of the doctrine of fallen angels to the final results of the witch dogma may be seen, for instance, in Henry Hallywell's Melampronoea: or A Discourse of the Polity and Kingdom of Darkness, 1681. Hally well had been a Fellow of Christ's College, Cambridge. 56 See p. 9, above.

hath concluded to speak the least of this subject which indeed requires most amply to be illustrated; therefore I thought fit to adjoyn this subsequent discourse; as succedaneous to the fore-going, and conducing to the compleating of the whole work. "'57

How far this subsequent discourse" is really fitted to complete Scot's work may be judged by a statement which it makes on the very first page, to the effect that bad spirits "are the grand Instigators, stirring up mans heart to attempt the inquiry after the darkest, and most mysterious part of Magick, or Witchcraft." And again a little later: "Great is the villany of Necromancers, and wicked Magicians, in dealing with the spirits of men departed; whom they invocate, with certain forms, and conjurations, digging up their Carkasses again, or by the help of Sacrifices, and Oblations to the infernal Gods; compelling the Ghost to present it self before them."58 All this is quite opposed to Scot's view and the whole intention of his book. The insertion of such worthless matter was, of course, a mere trick of the bookseller to make a new edition go off well. But the fact of its insertion shows that Scot was thought to have left his treatise incomplete or unsatisfactory in a most important point. And the inserted matter itself must have gone far to neutralize the effect of republication in a witch-haunted period. And so we may leave Reginald Scot, with our respect for his courage and common sense undiminished, but with a clear idea of the slight effect which his treatise must have had on the tone and temper of the age that we are studying.

John Webster's Displaying of Supposed Witchcraft, which appeared in 1677-the Preface is dated "February 23. 1673"-was particularly directed against Glanvill and Meric Casaubon. It holds a distinguished place in the history of witchcraft, and demands our careful scrutiny. What is usually thought of it has been eloquently expressed by the late Mr. James Crossley. "In this memorable book, writes Mr. Crossley, "he exhausts the subject, as far as

57 P. 39.

58

Page 46.

See Nicholson's reprint of the 1584 edition, p. xlii.

it is possible to do so, by powerful ridicule, cogent arguments, and the most varied and well applied learning, leaving to [Francis] Hutchinson, and others who have since followed in his track, little further necessary than to reproduce his facts and reasonings in a more popular, it can scarcely be said, in a more effective form.

1159

A few of Webster's opinions must be specified, that the reader may judge how far The Displaying of Supposed Witchcraft deserves to rank as a work of sober and scientific reason, and to what extent the author merits the position that seems to be traditionally assigned to him as an uncompromising assailant of superstition.

60

Angels, good and bad, are "really and truly corporeal" and not spirits, except "in a relative and respective" sense." Since devils are corporeal, Webster admits that "they may move and agitate other bodies." Their strength, however, is limited, "for though one Devil may be supposed to move or lift up that which would load an Horse, yet it will not follow that he can move or lift up as much as would load a Ship of a thousand Tun."61 Webster grants that "God doth make use of evil Angels to punish the wicked, and to chastise and afflict the godly, and in the effecting of these things that they have a power given them to hurt the earth and the Sea and things therein, as to bring tempests, thunder, lightning, plague, death, drought and the like. "62

Webster has a profound belief in apparitions and tells some capital ghost stories—"unquestionable testimonies,” he calls them, "either from our own Annals, or matters of fact that we know to be true of our own certain knowledge, that thereby it may undoubtedly appear, that there are effects that exceed the ordinary power of natural causes, and may for ever convince all Atheisticall minds. "64 One of

59

Introduction to the Chetham Society reprint of Potts's Discoverie of Witches, pp. xxxviii-xxxix.

60 Pages 202-215.

61 P. 228. Perhaps Webster is merely "putting a case" here; but he certainly seems to be making an admission, at least in theory.