Book 16, Chapter 4: Of one that was so bewitched that he could read no scriptures but canonicall, of a divel that could speake no Latine, a proofe that witchcraft is flat cousenage
1 Here I may aptlie insert another miracle of importance, that happened within the compasse of a childes remembrance, which may induce anie resonable bodie to conceive, that these supernaturall actions are but fables & cousenages. There was one, whom for some respects I name not, that was taken blind, deafe, & dumbe; so as no physician could helpe him. That man (forsooth) though he was (as is said) both blind, dumbe & deafe, yet could he read anie canonicall scriptures; but as for apocrypha, he could read none: wherein a Gods name consisted the miracle. But a leafe of apocrypha being extraordinarilie inserted among the canonicall scriptures, he read the same as authentike: wherein his knaverie was bewraied. Another had a divell, that answered men to all questions, marie hir divell could understand no Latine, and so was she (and by such meanes all the rest may be) bewraied. Indeed our witching writers saie, that certeine divels speake onelie the language of that countrie where they are resiant, as French, or English, &c.
2 Furthermore, in my conceipt, nothing prooveth more apparentlie that witchcraft is cousenage, and that witches instruments are but ridiculous bables, and altogither void of effect; than when learned and godlie divines, in their serious writings, produce experiments as wrought by witches, and by divels at witches commandements: which they expound by miracles, although indeed meere trifles. Whereof they conceive amisse, being overtaken with credulitie.
1 Moreover, the same author saith, that spirits whisper in our minds, and yet not speaking so lowd, as our eares may heare them: but in such sort as our soules speake together when they are dissolved; making an example by lowd speaking a farre off, and a comparison of soft whispering neere hand, so as the divell entreth so neere to the mind as the eare need not heare him; and that everie part of a divell or spirit seeth, heareth, and speaketh, &c. But herein I will beleeve Paule better than Psellus, or his monke, or the moonks divell. For Paule saith; If the whole bodie were an eie, where were hearing? If the whole bodie were hearing, where were smelling, &c. Whereby you may see what accord is betwixt Gods word and witchmongers.
2 The papists proceed in this matter, and saie, that these spirits use great knaverie and unspeakeable bawderie in the breech and middle parts of man and woman, by tickeling, and by other lecherous devises; so that they fall jumpe in judgement and opinion, though verie erroniouslie, with the foresaid Psellus, of whose doctrine also this is a parcell; to wit, that these divels hurt not cattell for the hate they beare unto them, but for love of their naturall and temperate heate and moisture, being brought up in deepe, drie and cold places: marie they hate the heate of the sun and the fier, bicause that kind of heate drieth too fast. They throwe downe stones upon men, but the blowes thereof doo no harme to them whome they hit; bicause they are not cast with anie force: for (saith he) the divels have little and small strength, so as these stones doo nothing but fraie and terrifie men, as scarecrowes doo birds out of the corne feelds. But when these divels enter into the pores, than doo they raise woonderfull tumults in the bodie and mind of man. And if it be a subterrene divell, it dooth writh and bow the possessed, and speaketh by him, using the spirit of the patient as his instrument. But he saith, that when Lucifugus possesseth a man, he maketh him dumbe, and as it were dead:
3 and these be they that are cast out (saith he) onelie by fasting and praier.
4 The same Psellus, with his mates Bodin and the penners of M. Mal. and others, doo find fault with the physicians that affirme such infirmities to be cureable with diet, and not by inchantments; saieng, that physicians doo onlie attend upon the bodie, & that which is perceiveable by outward sense; and that as touching this kind of divine philosophie, they have no skill at all. And to make divels and spirits seeme yet more corporall and terrene, he saith that certeine divels are belonging to certeine countries, and speake the languages of the same countries, and none other; some the Assyrian, some the Chaldæan, & some the Persian toong, and that they feele stripes, and feare hurt, and speciallie the dint of the sword (in which respect conjurors have swords with them in their circles, to terrifie them) and that they change shapes, even as suddenlie as men doo change colour with blushing, feare, anger, and other moods of the mind. He saith yet further, that there be brute beasts among them, and yet divels, and subject to anie kind of death; insomuch as they are so foolish, as they may be compared to flies, fleas, and wormes, who have no respect to any thing but their food, not regarding or remembring the hole from out of whence they came last.
5 Marrie divels compounded of earth, cannot often transforme themselves, but abide in some one shape, such as they best like, and most delight in; to wit, in the shape of birds or women: and therefore the Greeks call them Neidas, Nereidas, and Dreidas in the feminine gender; which Dreidæ inhabited (as some write) the ilands beside Scotland called Druidæ, which by that meanes had their denomination and name. Other divels that dwell in drier places transforme themselves into the masculine kind. Finallie Psellus saith they know our thoughts, and can prophesie of things to come. His definition is, that they are perpetuall minds in a passible bodie.
6 To verefie these toies he saith, that he himselfe sawe in a certeine night a man brought up by Aletus Libius into a mountaine, and that he tooke an hearbe, and spat thrise into his mouth, and annointed his eies with a certeine ointment, so as thereby he sawe great troopes of divels, and perceived a crowe to flie into his mouth; and since that houre he could prophesie at all times, saving on good fridaie, and easter sundaie. If the end of this tale were true, it might not onelie have satisfied the Greeke church, in keeping the daie of easter, togither with the church of Rome; but might also have made the pope (that now is) content with our christmas and easter daie, and not to have gathered the minuts together, and reformed it so, as to shew how falselie he and his predecessors (whome they saie could not erre) have observed it hitherto. And trulie this, and the dansing of the sunne on easter daie morning sufficientlie or rather miraculouslie proveth that computation, which the pope now beginneth to doubt of, and to call in question.
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