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Miracles of Witchcraft CHAP. 4 | | |
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promotion, welth, worship, pleasure, honor, knowledge, learning, or anie other | | |
benefit whatsoever, | | |
It falleth out many times, that neither their necessities, nor their expectation | | |
is answered or served, in those places where they beg or borrowe; but rather | | |
their lewdnesse* is by their neighbors reprooved. And further, in tract of time | | |
the witch waxeth odious and tedious to hir neighbors; and they againe are | | |
despised and despited of hir: so as sometimes she cursseth one, and sometimes | | |
another; and that from the maister of the house, his wife, children, cattell, &c. | | |
to the little pig that lieth in the stie. Thus in processe of time they have all dis- | | |
pleased hir, and she hath wished evill lucke unto them all; perhaps with cursses | | |
and imprecations made in forme.* Doubtlesse (at length) some of hir neighbors | | |
die, or fall sicke; or some of their children are visited with diseases that vex | | |
them strangelie: as apoplexies, epilepsies, convulsions, hot fevers, wormes, &c. | | |
Which by ignorant parents are supposed to be the vengeance of witches. Yea | | |
and their opinions and conceits* are confirmed and maintained by unskilfull | | |
physicians: according to the common saieng; Inscitiæ pallium maleficium & incan- | | |
tatio, Witchcraft and inchantment is the cloke of ignorance: whereas indeed evill | | |
humors,* & not strange words, witches, or spirits are the causes of such diseases. | | |
Also some of their cattell perish, either by disease or mischance. Then they, | | |
upon whom such adversities fall, weighing the fame that goeth upon this woman | | |
(hir words, displeasure, and cursses meeting so justlie with their misfortune) doo | | |
not onelie conceive, but also are resolved, that all their mishaps are brought | | |
to passe by hir onelie meanes. | | |
The witch on the other side exspecting hir neighbours mischances, and seeing | | |
things sometimes come to passe according to hir wishes, cursses, and incanta- | | |
tions (for Bodin* himselfe confesseth, that not above two in a hundred of their | | I. Bodin. li. 2. |
witchings or wishings take effect) being called before a justice, by due examina- | | de dæmono: |
tion of the circumstances is driven to see hir imprecations and desires and hir | | cap. 8. |
neighbors harmes and losses to concurre, and as it were to take effect: and so | | |
confesseth that she (as a goddes) hath brought such things to passe. Wherein, | | |
not onelie she, but the accuser, and also the justice are fowlie deceived and | | |
abused; as being thorough hir confession and other circumstances persuaded | | |
(to the injurie of Gods glorie) that she hath doone, or can doo that which is | | |
proper onelie to God himselfe. | | |
Another sort of witches there are, which be absolutelie cooseners.* These take | | |
upon them, either for glorie, fame, or gaine, to doo anie thing, which God or the | | |
divell can doo: either for foretelling of things to come, bewraieng of secrets, | | |
curing of maladies, or working of miracles. But of these I will talke more at | | |
large heereafter. | | |
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CHAPTER IV. | | |
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What miraculous actions are imputed to witches by witchmongers, papists, and poets. | | |
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ALTHOUGH it be quite against the haire, and contrarie to the divels | | |
will, contrarie to the witches oth, promise, and homage, and contrarie to | | |
all reason, that witches should helpe anie thing that is bewitched; but | | |
rather set forward their maisters businesse: yet we read In malleo maleficarum, of | | Mal. Malef. |
three sorts of witches; and the same is affirmed by all the writers heereupon, | | par. 2. quæst |
new and old. One sort (they say) can hurt and not helpe, the second can helpe | | I. cap. 2. |
and not hurt, the third can both helpe and hurt. And among the hurtfull | | |
witches he saith there is one sort more beastlie than any kind of beasts, saving | | |
woolves: for these usuallie devoure and eate yong children and infants of their | | |
owne kind. These be they (saith he) that raise haile, tempests, and hurtfull | | |
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