paralysis, apoplexy, leprosy, epilepsy, dropsy, strangury, etc. Dan. the 3rd point.And this they do easily with the help of Satan, who secretly causes persons to swallow certain poisons and drugs; or perhaps the witches themselves mix them with their food and drink. Sprenger, II. 1. 1.And according to the composition of the poison it will spread over the whole body or attack only one member; de Subtil.for, says Cardan, there are poisons which do not cause death, but continually attack one of the victims’ members. Mattioli. Pref. to Book 6 of Diosc.Again, according to Theophrastus, the poison may take two, three, or six months to prepare, and the illness of him who is bewitched will continue for a longer or shorter time according to the time taken to collect the ingredients of the drug. Witches very frequently dry up the milk of nurses, apparently by making them swallow a certain powder which they throw in their broth, unless it is Satan himself who plays this trick. Dan ibid.
Bodin, Demonom. IV. 5.Jannette Gresson, wife of Jean Liegeard des Granges, who was burned at Dôle some thirty years ago, in this way deprived of her milk, although it was very abundant, Clauda, the widow of the late Etienne Goguel, and Nicole Clauderey of Mossans.
They also cause a man’s virile member to disappear and be concealed, and then to reappear at their own pleasure. This is widely practised in Germany.
Wier, de Praestig. III. 18.Sprenger, II. 1. 7.
Can. Si per sortilegias, 33. q. 8.At times also they prevent carnal copulation between a man and a woman by relaxing the nerves and depriving the member of rigidity; at other times they prevent procreation by turning aside or blocking up the seminal ducts so that the semen does not reach the generative cells. And they hold a married couple thus bound for as long as it
