The Discovery of Witchcraft

The Discovery of Witchcraft

Reginald Scot

Part 1

_To the right worshipfull Sir Thomas Scot Knight, &c._

Sir, I see among other malefactors manie poore old women convented before you for working of miracles, other wise called witchcraft, and therefore I thought you also a meet person to whom I might cōmend my booke. And here I have occasion to speake of your sincere administration of justice, and of your dexteritie, discretion, charge, and travell emploied in that behalfe, wherof I am oculatus testis. Howbeit I had rather refer the reader to common fame, and their owne eies and eares to be satisfied; than to send them to a Stationers shop, where manie times lies are vendible, and truth contemptible. For I being of your house, of your name, & of your bloud; my foot being under your table, my hand in your dish, or rather in your pursse, might bee thought to flatter you in that, wherein (I knowe) I should rather offend you than please you. And what need I currie favour with my most assured friend? And if I should onelie publish those vertues (though they be manie) which give me speciall occasion to exhibit this my travell unto you, I should doo as a painter, that describeth the foot of a notable personage, and leaveth all the best features in his bodie untouched.

I therefore (at this time) doo onelie desire you to consider of my report, concerning the evidence that is commonlie brought before you against them. See first whether the evidence be not frivolous, & whether the proofs brought against them be not incredible, consisting of ghesses, presumptions, & impossibilities contrarie to reason, scripture, and nature. See also what persons complaine upon them, whether they be not of the basest, the unwisest, & most faithles kind of people. Also may it please you to waie what accusations and crimes they laie to their charge, namelie: She was at my house of late, she would have had a pot of milke, she departed in a chafe bicause she had it not, she railed, she curssed, she mumbled and whispered, and finallie she said she would be even with me: and soone after my child, my cow, my sow, or my pullet died, or was strangelie taken. Naie (if it please your Worship) I have further proofe: I was with a wise woman, and she told me I had an ill neighbour, & that she would come to my house yer it were long, and so did she; and that she had a marke above hir waste, & so had she: and God forgive me, my stomach hath gone against hir a great while. Hir mother before hir was counted a witch, she hath beene beaten and scratched by the face till bloud was drawne upon hir, bicause she hath beene suspected, & afterwards some of those persons were said to amend. These are the certeinties that I heare in their evidences.

Note also how easilie they may be brought to confesse that which they never did, nor lieth in the power of man to doo: and then see whether I have cause to write as I doo. Further, if you shall see that infidelitie, poperie, and manie other manifest heresies be backed and shouldered, and their professors animated and hartened, by yeelding to creatures such infinit power as is wrested out of Gods hand, and attributed to witches: finallie, if you shall perceive that I have faithfullie and trulie delivered and set downe the condition and state of the witch, and also of the witchmonger, and have confuted by reason and lawe, and by the word of God it selfe, all mine adversaries objections and arguments: then let me have your countenance against them that maliciouslie oppose themselves against me.

My greatest adversaries are yoong ignorance and old custome. For what follie soever tract of time hath fostered, it is so superstitiouslie pursued of some, as though no error could be acquainted with custome. But if the lawe of nations would joine with such custome, to the maintenance of ignorance, and to the suppressing of knowledge; the civilest countrie in the world would soone become barbarous, &c. For as knowledge and time discovereth errors, so dooth superstition and ignorance in time breed them. And concerning the opinions of such, as wish that ignorance should rather be mainteined, than knowledge busilie searched for, bicause thereby offense may grow: I answer, that we are commanded by Christ himselfe to search for knowledge: for it is the kings honour (as Salomon saith) to search out a thing.

The opinion of divers old writers touching dreames, and how they varie in noting the causes therof. p. 179.

Against interpretors of dreames, of the ordinarie cause of dreames, Hemingius his opinion of diabolicall dreames, the interpretation of dreames ceased. pag. 180.

That neither witches, nor anie other, can either by words or herbs, thrust into the mind of a sleeping man, what cogitations or dreames they list; and whence magicall dreames come. pag. 181.

How men have beene bewitched, cousened or abused by dreames to dig and search for monie. pag. 182.

The art & order to be used in digging for monie, revealed by dreames, how to procure pleasant dreames, of morning and midnight dreames. p. 183.

Sundrie receipts & ointments, made and used for the transportation of witches, and other miraculous effects: an instance thereof reported and credited by some that are learned. pag. 184.

A confutation of the former follies, as well cōcerning ointments, dreams, &c. as also of the assemblie of witches, and of their consultations and bankets at sundrie places, and all in dreames. pag. 185.

That most part of prophesies in the old testament were revealed in dreams, that we are not now to looke for such revelations, of some who have drempt of that which hath come to passe, that dreames proove contrarie, Nebuchadnez zars[*] rule to know a true expositor of dreames. pag. 187.

¶ _The eleventh Booke._

The Hebrue word Nahas expounded, of the art of augurie, who invented it, how slovenlie a science it is: the multitude of sacrifices and sacrificers of the heathen, and the causes thereof. Pag. 189.

Of the Jewes sacrifice to Moloch, a discourse thereupon, and of Purgatorie. pag. 190.

The Cambals[*] crueltie, of popish sacrifices exceeding in tyrannie the Jewes or Gentiles. pag. 191.

The superstition of the heathen about the element of fier, and how it grew in such reverence among them, of their corruptions, and that they had some inkling of the godlie fathers dooings in that behalfe. pag. 191.

Of the Romane sacrifices, of the estimation they had of augurie, of the lawe of the twelve tables. pag. 192.

Colleges of augurors, their office, their number, the signification of augurie, that the practisers of that art were couseners, their profession, their places of exercise, their apparell, their superstition. pag. 193.

The times and seasons to exercise augurie, the maner and order thereof, of the ceremonies thereunto belonging. pag. 195.

Upon what signes and tokens augurors did prognosticate, observations touching the inward and outward parts of beasts, with notes of beasts behaviour in the slaughterhouse. pag. 196.

A confutation of augurie, Plato his reverend opinion thereof, of contrarie events, & false predictions. p. 196.

The cousening art of sortilege or lotarie, practiced especiallie by Aegyptian vagabonds, of allowed lots, of Pythagoras his lot, &c. pag. 197.

Of the Cabalisticall art, consisting of traditions and unwritten verities learned without booke, and of the division thereof. cap. 198.

When, how, and in what sort sacrifices were first ordained, and how they were prophaned, and how the pope corrupteth the sacraments of Christ. pag. 200.

Of the objects whereupon the augurors used to prognosticate, with certeine cautions and notes. pag. 201.

The division of augurie, persons admittable into the colleges of augurie, of their superstition. pag. 202.

Of the common peoples fond and superstitious collections and observations. pag. 203.

How old writers varie about the matter, the maner, and the meanes, whereby things augurificall are mooved. pag. 205.

How ridiculous an art augurie is, how Cato mocked it, Aristotles reason against it, fond collections of augurors, who allowed, and who disallowed it. pag. 206.

Fond distinctions of the heathen writers, concerning augurie. pag. 208.

Of naturall and casuall augurie, the one allowed,and the other disallowed. pag. 208.

A confutation of casual augurie which is meere witchcraft, and upon what uncerteintie those divinations are grounded. pag. 209.