we might at least have learned the dates of Guazzo’s birth, of his profession in the Order, and his death, have been lost for many a century. There remain then his writings, three in number, the first and most important being the “Compendium Maleficarum,” which was originally published at Milan, “Apud Haeredes Augustini Tradati,” in 1608. This golden treatise is dedicated to the Protector of the Ambrosiani, Cardinal Orazio Maffei, and the preface is signed in the month of May. Guazzo was indeed no mere prodigy of the lecture-room and the schools, for he brought his genius to bear upon the pressing problems of a much-distracted time, and perhaps there was no business which more immediately required examination and remedy than the evil of witchcraft. The north of Italy and the remoter Alpine villages had for some reason long been infected to an almost unexampled degree. It was at Asti in Piedmont that well-nigh six hundred years before a society of devil-worshippers had been almost accidentally discovered, largely owing to their zeal for proselytism, and in spite of all efforts, both ecclesiastical and civil, it would seem that these had never wholly been stamped out, but that the dark tradition lingered and was perpetuated in obscure and evil ambuscades. It may be that throughout the thirty years’ incumbency of the Cardinal Archbishop Ippolito d’Este (1520–1550), always absent from his see, this cult waxed strong in common with many another dereliction and abuse. Certain it is that during the tenure of S. Carlo Borromeo, that great prelate was well-nigh overwhelmed by the corruptions of Milan, and indeed of his whole diocese. On one occasion he received the submission and confessions of no less than one hundred and thirty sorcerers. Another time as he was passing through a certain village it was noticed he refused to give his blessing to any house or to any individual save the parish priest alone, whom he informed that the folk were, one and all, secret Satanists.
In Milan itself the votaries of this hidden worship were to be met on every side. They vended charms and love-brews, poisons and philtres; almost openly they boasted of their skill in necromantic lore, their traffic with demons, their sabbats and sorceries, enormously corrupting the whole city.
It was at the instant request of a prelate of rare learning and keenest intelligence, Cardinal Federico Borromeo, the cousin and successor of San Carlo, and Archbishop of Milan from 1595 to 1631 that Fra Francesco-Maria Guazzo composed his encyclopaedic “Compendium Maleficarum,” “in the which is fully set forth the vile craft and enmity of
