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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A55138	A pleasant treatise of witches their imps, and meetings, persons bewitched, magicians, necromancers, incubus, and succubus's, familiar spirits, goblings, pharys, specters, phantasms, places haunted, and devillish impostures : with the difference between good and bad angels, and a true relation of a good genius / by a pen neer the covent of Eluthery.	Pen neer the Covent of Eluthery.	1673 (1673)	Wing P2564; ESTC R9332	44,947	136

A Pleasant TREATISE OF Witches Their Imps and Meetings Persons bewitched Magicians Necromancers Incubus and Succubus's Familiar Spirits Goblings Pharys Specters Phantasms Places Haunted and Devillish Impostures WITH The difference between Good and Bad Angels and a true Relation of a good GENIUS By a Pen neer the Covent of ELUTHERY LONDON Printed by H. B. for C. Wilkinson at the Black Boy in Fleetstreet and Tho. Archer and Tho. Burrell under St. Dunstans-Church 1673. TO THE READER THere is an inward Inclination and desire of Knowledge gentle Reader which hath moved many grave Learned Authors amongst the rest of their inquiries to search into the Nature of those things which because they are beyond the reach of common capacity seem to the vulgar Fables only and Poetical Fictions Amongst the rest of those things there is nothing hath been more cry'd down by some and upheld by others nothing has had more Defendants on either side than the possibility of man's having familiarity with Demons This general Curiosity drew me in among the rest that were ignorant of such matters and caused me for my own Recreation as well as Satisfaction to allot some spare hours to a stricter inquiry into these things but their scope being so large and so far extended so many Arguments stand on the one side so many on the other that I fell short of any just determination Nevertheless like that Merchant that misses sometimes his designs yet alwayes comes home well laden I have found many things by the way and fill'd this small Treatise with the Pith and Marrow of above a hundred Antient and Modern Authors whose pleasant Relations have not only been delightful to my self in their Collection but have wrought so effectually on the Ears of some that have heard but two or three of them that not through any desire of mine but by their frequent and earnest intreaties I have used these means to satisfie them and to present thee with this compendious Treatise and that thy Acceptance of it may be kind according to my desires you shall find nothing here of those Vulgar Fabulous and Idle Tales that are not worth the lending an ear to nor of those hideous Sawcer-eyed and Cloven-Footed Divels that Grandams affright their children withal but only the pleasant and well-grounded discourses of the Learned as an object adequate to thy wise understanding Farewel Index CHAP. I. The manner of the Witches Profession CHAP. II. Their Imps and Meetings CHAP. III. Persons Bewitched CHAP. IV. Magicians and Negromancers CHAP. V. Incubus and Succubus CHAP. VI. Familiar Spirits Goblings and Pharies CHAP. VII Specters and Phantasms CHAP. VIII Places Haunted CHAP. IX Divellish Impostures CHAP. X. An admirable and true Process of a Woman that wrought Miracles by the help of the Divel CHAP. XI The horrid end of witches and Negromancers CHAP. XII The difference between good and bad Spirits and the true Relation of a good Genius A Pleasant Treatise of WITCHES c. CHAP. I. The manner of the Witches Profession INcoherent various and deceitful will all the Institutions of Satan appear whether we consider him in his ambiguous Oracles deceiving the Heathen World in his subtilty to create himself a worship and followers so obedient as to sacrifice their of-springs to him but more especially in his seducing some poor miscreants so far as to contract a bargain with them for their bodies and souls for ever Such are persons St. Chrisost. lib. de provid ad Stag. Monac perversly instituted in Religion envious malicious and distrusting Gods mercyes who to satisfie their unreasonable desires in those things they could not otherwise perform have hearkened to his flatteries renounced their Faith and made themselves his slaves and subjects Nevertheless to make his worship become more solemn and his servants tye the greater many horrible and detestable ceremonies are perform'd at their first reception the summ of all is this The Wizards and Witches being met in a place and time appointed where the Devil appears to them in humane shape admonisheth them to be faithful promises them success and length of life they that are present recommend the Novice to him and the Devil if the party will renounce the Christian Faith the Sacraments and tread upon the Cross gives him his hand adding moreover that this is not alone sufficient but that he will have an homage also containing that he give himself to him body and soul for ever and bring as many as possibly he may into the same societ●…y furthermore that he prepare himself certain Oyntments This we inquisitors say the Authors of a Book called Malleus Maleficarum know being fully informed by a young Witch Another marryed youth is said to have confessed to Peter Judge in Boltingen after this manner That the rest of the society on Sunday before the water was consecrated brought the new Disciple into the Church where he denyed his faith c. and promised homage to his little Master for so they call him Magisterulum and no otherwise then he drinks out of a Bottle presently which being done he begins to conceive something of his Profession and is confirmed in the principall Rites of it Manlius writes concerning their abominable profession that in the Year 1553. two Witches sto●…e a Child from their neighbour kild it cut it in pieces and put it into a Kittle to boil when the sorrowful Mother looking for her Infant came by chance into the house and found the limbs thereof horribly consumed For which abominable Fact the Authors of it were burnt having first in their torture confessed this part of their horrible profession Two other Witches are reported by Spranger to have kild the one forty Children unchristned the other an infinite number and R. P. P. Valdarama the Spaniard relates that in Germany were taken eight Witches who confessed to have murthered One hundred forty five Children in the making their Oyntments CHAP. II. Of their familiar Imps and their meetings THey are likewise reported by the same Author to have each of them a Spirit or lmp attending on and assigned to them which never leave those to whom they are subject but assist and render them all the service they command These give the Witches notice to be ready on all Solemn appointments and meetings which are ordinarily on Tuesday or Wednesday night and then they strive to separate themselves from the company of all other Creatures not to be seen by any and night being come they strip themselves naked and anoint themselves with their Oyntments Then are they carryed out of the house either by the Window Door or Chimney mounted on their Imps in form of a Goat Sheep or Dragon till they arrive at their meeting place whither all the other Wizards and Witches each one upon his Imps are also brought Thus brought to the designed place which is sometimes many hundred miles from their dwellings they find a great number of others arrived there by the same means who before

the swelling a great quantity of matter gushed out and th●… knife's end appeared in the Rupture The maid would ●…ave pulled it out but her friends hindred her and sent immediately for the Dukes Chyrurgeon of the Castle of U uolffenbuttle who first sent a Minister to her to comfort her and instruct her in God's word for as much as she had been troubled by the Devil and on the next day which was Sunday he opened the flesh and took out the knife which was the very same that was lost being only consumed a little about the edge Hector Boethius gives us an admirable Relation concerning King Duffus that he fell into a great malady yet not so greiveous as it was hard to be known by the best Physitians of that time for without any signe of Bile Phlegme or the redundancy of any evil humour the King was grievously tormented every night with perpetual watchings and continual sweatings and found but very little ease in the day-time his body wasted away by degrees his skin grew hard and close shewing to the beholders both the Veins Nerves and situation of the very bones Nevertheless by the regular motion of his pulse it was manifest that nothing of his radical moisture was wasted and the colour of his lip cheeks and ears still remained vigorous and temperate and his appetite was no way abated These good signs in a languishing body and one that was afflicted with much pain the Physitians much admired and when by all their Art they could neither cause him to sleep nor make his sweating cease but that the King grew worse and worse to both they desired him to be of comfort for it might be that some Physitians of other Nations knew the nature of his disease and could cure it whom they would send for by which means he might recover his health But by this time there grew a strange rumour amongst the common people that the King was bewitched and that his disease proceeded not from any natural cause but by the Magick Art of certain women living at Forres a City of Moravia who used those means to the destruction of the King This report soon came to the Kings ear and least the Witches hearing they were discovered should make their escape there were men sent secretly to Moravia to enquire concerning this matter the messengers dissembled the cause of their coming and under pretence of a League they were to make between King Duffus and those of Moravia they came to the City Forres and were by night let into the Castle for that stood as yet for the King here they told the Governour Donevaldus what the King had commanded them to search and desired his aid and assistance in this matter Now a certain young whore whose mother was a Witch one of her Lovers a Souldier had learned by what means her mother wrought her Inchantments and had learnt something concerning the Kings Life and Fortune this he told Donevaldus and Donevaldus related it to the Kings Ambassadors and sent for the woman who was then in the Castle whom he constrained to tell the whole matter and the manner of her mothers proceedings and Souldiers were sent at night secretly to search the business more narrowly The Messengers came to the witches house broke it open and found one of them turning on a spit by the fire a waxen Image made by their Art like to King Duffus another was reciting certain Spels and pouring leisurely a certain liquor upon the Image They took them both and brought them to the Castle with the Image and the liquor where being examined the cause of these deeds they confessed that while the Image was roasting the King never ceased to sweat and while they recited their Charms he never slept and that as the wax melted away so the King consumed and would dye after all was spent as the Devil had informed them moreover that they were hired to do this by those of Moravia These things so incensed the hearers that they caused them both immediately to be burnt with the Image at which very time as afterwards it was known while this passed at Forres the King was eased of his pain and rested that night without swearing and the next day his former strength returning he grew better and lived long after in as perfect health as ever he had been before this calamity happened unto him Gulielmus Malmesburiensis Monachus writes in his History that there were in the time of Peter Damion two old women living in the way that leads to Rome that kept an Inn and that as oft as they had any single passenger they turn'd him into an Ass or Hog and sold him to the Merchants at last having for their Guest a young man that by Fidling and Jugling got his livelihood they turn'd him into an Ass who by the strangeness of his Actions for his understanding was nothing altered drew many passengers to the house and by this means they gained great Custome and no small advantage at last a neighbour of theirs proffered great summs of money for him and at length purchased him but with this caution that he was never to ride him into the Water which for some time was punctually observed but the Ass getting one day at liberty ran into the next Pool of water where after he had cooled himself a little he came to his former shape The like is reported by the Inquisiter Spranger of a Souldier in the Isle of Cyprus who was also turned into an Ass yet his reason remained and he followed his old companions to their Ship but supposed to be a real Ass was beaten away and forced to return to the Witche house that had so transform'd him In this shape he serv'd her three years till passing one day before a Church he was seen to kneel on his hinder legs and to lift up them before at the holding up of the Sacrament of the Altar which action some Geneva Merchants perceiveing apprehended the owner and with torture made her confess how she had inchanted him and converted him into that form and to render him the likeness of man again The Witch was burnt at Famagoste and the youth returned to England affirming that his mind was never so much troubled but that he knew himself to be a man nevertheless his imagination was so deceived by the Devil that he sometimes thought himself to be a Beast and yet had alway this contentment that he was known by the other Magicians and Witches to be a true man CHAP. IV. Of Magicians and Negromancers COrnelius Agrippa the great Magician going one day out of Town from Louain where he dwelt left the Keyes of his Study with his wife charging her strictly to let no body go in but it hapned so that day that a young companion of Agrippa a Schollar and having ever had a curiosity to see some of this Negromancers books came to the house and with much importunity gained the keyes then entring the

room and viewing the books he perceived a Manuscript of Agrippa's amongst the rest as it were a compendium of them this he reads and in short space raises an ill favour'd Devil who entring the study asked what he would have that he call'd him so the young man unexperienced frightned and ignorant what to say was choaked by the Spirit and left dead on the ground Agrippa not long after returns home and finds the Devil dancing and shewing tricks upon the house top at which astonished he goes into his Study and finds the dead body which he commands his spirit to enter and carry to the place where the Students used to meet this being done and the spirit quitting the body it fell down and was buryed for dead having some marks only of strangulation about the Throat But not long after the matter was discovered and Agrippa for safty fled to Lorrain There was in the Emperor Maximilians Court a famous Negromancer as Authors affirm who at his command and promise of pardon and reward took upon him to shew the shapes of the three great Warriers Hector Achilles and King David upon condition of silence when they appeared and the Emperor he places in the midst of his Magick Circle seats him in his Throne and afterwards reading and murmuring certain Charms out of his Pocket-Book he desires silence Hector then knocks at the door so vehemently that the whole house shook and the door being opened he came in with a bright Speer in his hand his Eye fiery and his Stature exceeding other mens Not long after in the same Majestical postture came in Achilles looking fiercely towards Hector and often shaking his Speer as though he would have invaded him Thus having thrice passed by the Emperor and made Obeysance they vanished Afterwards came in King David in his Crown and Princely Robes with his Harp in his hand His countenance was more gracious then that of the other two and he passed likewise thrice by the Emperor but wi●…hout Reverence to him and went away The Magician being asked by the Emperor why King David denyed him the respect the other two gave answered that all things were subject to his Kingdom for asmuch as Christ sprang from him Saint Augustine writes of Pythagoras that whether by natural Magick or some secret agreement with the Devil it is doubted by Authors he kept a Bear of prodigious greatness with him many years and at last making him swear never to hurt any Beast gave him liberty and sent him into the Woods The same Magician being near Tarent and seeing an Ox eating in a field of Beans called to the herdsman to drive the beast from eating the Beans But the surly clown made answer he might chastise him himself if he would as he used to whip his Boys Whereupon Pythagor as making certain magick Characters on the ground and muttering some Charms to himself caused the beast to come out of the Beans as if it had been endued with reason and ever after it refused the Yoke and retired to Tarent living among the inhabitants and taking her food from the hands of Men Women and Children A certain Magician at Madeburg was us'd to shew a little Horse to the people in the Market place for money commanding it to do many rare things which always it performed But complaining one day to the people in the end of his shew that he had got very little that the times were very hard and the like he wisht that he were in heaven then throwing up the bridle into the air the horse followed it and he as if he would have stayed it by the tail was carryed up also his wife catched hold of him his maid of her and all fly up into the air like so many links of a chain Now while the people were looking and wondring at it a certain Citizen came to the multitude and understanding the matter affirmed that he met but a little before the Magician going to his Inn. To this purpose Niderius also reports that in the year 1045 a certain Magician in England was seen to mount on a black horse on a Sabbath day and to be carryed away through the air Henry the third King of France had a brother called the Duke of Allenzon who came to England formerly to be a suiter to Queen Elizabeth in whose retinue was the Valiant Busidamboyes who took the Dukes part between whom and the King was a perpetual sued The King therefore by nature timerous and suspicious was always afraid of this valiant person and after his return into France devised several means to take him out of the way Amongst the rest coming by night out of the Louure he was set upon by seventeen armed and appointed men ye●… behaved himself so stoutly that he killed five of them and made his escape The King seeing he had mist of him and that ever after he stood upon his Guard put in tryal another way For there being a constant report at Court that Bussidamboyes was in favour with the Earl of Monsurrous wife he sent for an Italian Negromancer famous at that time and called ●…riscalino Of him he enquires if he could shew or declare to him what Bussidamboyes was then doing which the Magician after certain conjurations shewed him in a Glass where was Bussidamboyes in bed with a Lady Hereupon the King sent for his Courtiers amongst whom was the Earl of Monsorrou at that time and a●…ked if they knew that Lady The Earl much abased replyed it was his wife Then said the King I will have no Culckolds to be my Courtiers To which the Earl made answer that to hinder what was done was not in his power but that it was in the Kings to give him leave to avenge himself which he earnestly requested The King glad to be any ways rid of Bussidamboyes gave his assent and the Earl posted away immediately to his own house and coming betimes in the morning to his wife as she lay in bed offered her the choice of three things either a draught of Poyson a Dagger to kill her self or to write such a Letter as he would dictate to her The miserable woman terrified with the thoughts of death consented to the Latter and according to her husbands dictating sent for Bussidamboyes who suspected nothing to come unto her In the mean time the Earl concealed himself in the house armed with six more and behind the Curtains in her chamber Bussidamboyes came not long after and offering to go up stairs in his accustomed manner was desired by a Page set for that purpose to leave his Spurs and his Sword below because his Lady was ill and the least noise disturbed her This he did not mistrusting what would follow but as soon he entred the Chamber the Lady gave a sign and all rusht in upon him Nevertheless being of an undaunted courage he took the first chair he found and so behaved himself with that weapon by reason of his great