because he was especially outraged by the fact that the judges dared not acquit and free anyone whom they had tortured, because to do so would publish the fact that they had acted hastily and erroneously. In spite of the frightful treatment to which they were subjected, some women held out through the torture and were entitled to acquittal; in the logic of the times this proved that the devil helped them.[1] Von Spee was born in 1591, wrote his book in 1627, when he was a professor at Würzburg, and published it anonymously. He had been confessor to condemned witches, and was led to remonstrate against the irrationality of the proceedings. "Treat the heads of the Church," said he, "treat the judges, or treat me, as you treat these unhappy persons — subject us to the same tortures, and you will find wizards in us all."[2] Montaigne had more success: in 1588 he led the reaction in France, treating the delusion with scorn. Hobbes, in England, followed him, but Sir Matthew Hale, a distinguished judge, and Sir Thomas Browne, a prominent physician, held the proofs of the reality of witchcraft to be indisputable.[3] The former wrote a book to defend the doctrine of witches.[4] The whole Puritan party was carried into great excess in this matter, apparently by their fanatical doctrine of the Scriptures. Witch persecution reached the highest point of cruelty and inhumanity in Scotland, as it seems, and the invention of instruments of torture seems there to have reached its
- ↑ Hoensbroech: l.c., I, 531.
- ↑ Ebner, T.: Friedrich von Spee und die Hexenprocesse seiner Zeit; Hansen, J.: l.c, 445.
- ↑ Lecky, W. E. H.: Rationalism, I, 128.
- ↑ Witchcraft. A Collection of Modern Relations of Matter of Fact Concerning Witches and Witchcraft Upon the Persons of People. To which is prefixed a Meditation Concerning the Mercy of God in Preserving Us from the Malice and Power of Evil Angels. Written in 1661. 12mo, pp. 64. It is very rare and is insignificant.
