from them, or whether it is due to something else. But how would they not themselves be hurt by the poison which they emanated? Or how comes it that the force of the poison dwells in their eyes only, and that it hurts only the enemies of the witches, and not all sorts of people indifferently? Nothing is more certain than that, in such cases, it is Satan who kills or causes injury.
And if there have been families in Africa and Italy and Scythia and elsewhere which claimed to be able to kill by their looking, who can doubt that such people were witches and that Satan performed the murders which they wished to commit? We should think the same of the shepherd who bewitched the lambs in Vergil, and of those who injure the crops and the trees by looking at them.
Touching their effect on a Judge, I may well believe that a witch can, by looking at him, soften his heart by causing him to feel pity and compassion for her misery. For since the eyes are the messengers of the soul, they tell the Judge the inner torments and perplexity which the witch suffers. But I cannot be persuaded that a Judge can be corrupted by this means, for the eyes have no power to bribe. And of this I am the more assured, since it has been proved that a witch can in no way injure the Officers of Justice; for Justice comes directly from God, and can by no means be confounded.
Passing to the matter of the Basilisk and the serpent Catoblepas, I shall say that the most learned scholars hold what has been written of them to be a fable. And Mattioli has asked how it has been possible to examine these serpents