Sixthly and Lastly The Spectre said that to morrow he should be with him which was not true for several days intervened before the Battle But the word to morrow need not be taken in strictness but in a Latitude of interpretation for a short time He was to dye in or upon the Fight and the enemies were now ready sor it and so the event was to be within a very little while The prediction of which was a Prophecy of a thing very contingent and shews that the Predictor was the real Samuel SECT XXVIII An Answer to that Objection That if it was Samuel s Soul that appeared it makes nothing to Witchcraft BUt if it were the real Samuel will they say this Story will then make nothing for the Opinion of Witchcraft For Samuel was not raised by enchantment but came either of his own accord or on a Divine Errand To which Objection I say First Here is at least proof of an Apparition of a Man after Death Secondly Sauls going to this Pythoness upon such an Inquiry and she undertaking to bring the person up whom he should name at least the appearance of him intimated v. 11. are good proof that this had been her practice though at this time over ruled and that she acted by an Evil Spirit For certainly when Saul intreats her to Divine to him by her Familiar Spirit he did not mean that she should deceive and delude him by a Confederate Knave The senslesness of which Figment I have already sufficiently disproved That the Woman was used to such practices will appear fully when I come to prove Witchcraft from * express Texts ADVERTISEMENT * The express Texts that he means I suppose are such as these Exod. 22. 18 2 Chron. 33. 6. Gal. 5. 20. Micah 5. 12. Acts 13. 6. 8. and Chap. 8. 9. and more especially Deut. 18. 10. Where almost all the Names of Witches are enumerated namely of all those that are inveigled by Covenant with Evil Spirits either explicitly or by submitting to their Ceremonies See Dr. H M his Postscript SECT XXIX They that hold it was an Evil Spirit that appeared to Saul that their opinion may be true for ought Mr. Webster brings against it AS to the Opinion of divers Divines that the appearing Samuel was indeed an Evil Spirit in his likeness though I judge it not so probable as the other of the real Samuel yet the interpretation is not absurd nor impossible And because I do not absolutely determine either way I shall defend it against Mr. Websters contrary Arguments which whether it be so or not so prove nothing He saith First That this beggs two false suppositions p. 175. as First That the Devils are simply incorporeal Spirits By which if he means Incorporeal in their Intrinsick Essential Constitution such no doubt they are as every Intellectual Being is But if he mean by simply Incorporeal disunited from all Matter and Body so perhaps and most likely they are not But neither the one or the other of these is supposed by the Opinion Mr. Webster impugnes The second false supposition is That Devils can assume Bodies That they can appear in divers Shapes and Figures like humane and other Bodies we affirm and it is plain from the Scripture as to Angels and I shall make the same good in reference to other Spirits in due place So that we may suppose it still till Mr. Webster hath evinced the contrary as he promiseth How he performs I shall consider in due place His Second Argument is That he is not of their Opinion that the Devils move and rove up and down in this Elementary World at pleasure Which no one I know saith They go to and fro and compass the Earth but still within the bounds of the Divine permission the Laws of the Angelical World and those of their own Kingdom which prevent the Troubles and Disturbances in the World from them which he saith would ensue ADVERTISEMENT Thus far runs the Proof of the Existence of Apparitions and Witchcraft from Holy Scripture entire The three or four Lines that follow in the M S. and are left out break off abruptly But what is said sufficiently subverts the force of Mr. Webster ' s Arguments against their Opinion that say it was the Devil that appeared to Saul I will only here take notice that this part which reaches hitherto though it be not fully finished yet it abundantly affords Proof for the Conclusion namely for the Existence of Spirits Apparitions and Witches from Testimony of Holy Scripture to as many as yield to the Authority thereof But the following Collection is a Confirmation of the same things as well to the Anti-Scripturists as to them that believe Scripture And the leading Story of the Daemon of Tedworth I hope now will prove irrefragable and unexceptionable if the Reader retain in his mind Mr. Glanvil ' s Preface to this second Part of his Saducismus Triumphatus and Mr. Mompesson ' s Letters the one to Mr. Glanvil the other to Mr. Collins which cannot but abundantly undeceive the World So that it is needless to record how Mr. Glanvil wrote to Mr. William Claget of Bury and professed He had not the least ground to think he was imposed on in what he related and that he had great cause from what he saw himself to say it was impossible there should be any Imposture in that business To the same purpose he wrote to Mr. Gilbert Clark in Northampton-shire as also to my self and undoubtedly to many more as he has intimated in his Preface Besides that to the Parties above named he sent a Copy of that Letter of Mr. Mompesson which was wrote to himself So that that groundless Rumour being thus fully silenced we may now seasonably relate and that with confidence that assured and unexceptionably attested Story of the Daemon of Tedworth Which is as follows Proof of Apparitions Spirits and Witches from a choice Collection of modern Relations RELATION I. Which is the enlarged Narrative of the Daemon of Tedworth or of the Disturbances at Mr. Mompesson s House caused by Witchcraft and the villany of the Drummer MR. John Mompesson of Tedworth in the County of Wilts being about the middle of March in the Year 1661. at a Neighboring Town called Ludgarshal and hearing a Drum beat there he inquired of the Bailiff of the Town at whose House he then was what it meant The Bailiff told him that they had for some days been troubled with an idle Drummer who demanded money of the Constable by vertue of a pretended Pass which he thought was counterfeit Upon this Mr. Mompesson sent for the Fellow and askt him by what authority he went up and down the Country in that manner with his Drum The Drummer answered he had good authority and produced his Pass with a Warrant under the Hands of Sir William Cawly and Colonel Ayliff of Gretenham Mr. Mompesson knowing these Gentlemens Hands discovered that the Pass and Warrant were
Saducismus Triumphatus OR Full and Plain EVIDENCE Concerning WITCHES AND APPARITIONS In TWO PARTS The First treating of their POSSIBILITY The Second of their Real EXISTENCE By Joseph Glanvil late Chaplain in Ordinary to his Majesty and Fellow of the Royal Society With a Letter of Dr. HENRY MORE on the same Subject And an Authentick but wonderful story of certain Swedish Witches done into English by Anth. Horneck Preacher at the Savoy LONDON Printed for J. Collins at his Shop under the Temple-Church and S. Lownds at his Shop by the Savoy-gate 1681. And Saul perceiued that it was Samuel and he stouped with his face to the ground and bowed himself 1 st Samuel Chap 28 â— 14. W. Faith orne fecit TO THE Right Reverend Father in God SETH Lord Bishop of SARUM Chancellor of the GARTER This New and Compleated EDITION OF Saducismus Triumphatus Is most humbly Dedicated to your Lordship By My Lord Your Lordships most Obliged and Humble Servant The PUBLISHER James Collins THE PUBLISHER TO THE READER Reader THat thou hast no sooner enjoyed this long-expected Edition thou canst not justly blame either the Author or my self Not my self for I could not publish the book before I had it nor the Author because many unexpected occasions drove off his mind to other matters and interrupted him in his present design insomuch that he was snatcht away by Death before he had quite finished it But though the learned World may very well lament the loss of so able and ingenious a Writer yet as to this present point if that may mitigate thy sorrow in all likelihood this Book had not seen the light so soon if he had lived so many emergent occasions giving him new interruptions and offering him new temptations to further delay Indeed it had been desirable that it might have had the polishing of his last hand as the peruser of his Papers signifies in his last Advertisement But to compensate this loss the said Peruser a friend as well to his Design as to his Person as digested those Materials he left into that order and distinctness and has so tied things together and supplied them in his Advertisements that to the judicious Reader nothing can seem wanting that may serve the ends of his intended Treatise Not to intimate what considerable things are added more than it is likely had been if he had finished it himself For besides the Advertisements of the careful Peruser of his Papers and that notable late Story of the Swedish Witches translated out of German into the English Tongue there is also added a short Treatise of the true and genuine Notion of a Spirit taken out of Dr. More 's Enchiridion Metaphysicum to entertain those that are more curious searchers into the nature of these things The Number also of the Stories are much increased above what was designed by Mr. Glanvil though none admitted but such as seemed very well attested and highly credible to his abovesaid Friend and such as rightly understood contain nothing but what is consonant to right Reason and sound Philosophy as I have heard him earnestly avouch though it had been too tedious to have explained all and it may be more grateful to the Reader to be left to exercise his own wit and ingeny upon the rest These are the advantages this Edition of Mr. Glanvil's Daemon of Tedworth and his Considerations about Witchcraft have above any Edition before though the last of them was so bought up that there was not a Copy of them to be had in all London and Cambridge but the Peruser of his Papers was fain to break his own to serve the Press with If these intimations may move thy Appetite to the reading so pleasant and useful a Treatise And yet I can add one thing more touching the story of the Daemon of Tedworth which is very considerable It is not for me indeed to take notice of that meanness of spirit in the Exploders of Apparitions and Witches which very strangely betrayed it self in the decrying of that well-attested Narrative touching the Stirrs in Mr. Mompesson's house Where although they that came to be Spectators of the marvelous things there done by some invisible Agents had all the liberty imaginable even to the ripping of the Bolsters open to search and try if they could discover any natural cause or cunning Artifice whereby such strange feats were done and numbers that had free access from day to day were abundantly satisfied of the reality of the thing that the house was haunted and disturbed by Daemons or Spirits yet some few years after the Stirrs had ceased the truth of this story lying so uneasie in the minds of the disgusters of such things they raised a Report when none of them no not the most diligent and curious could detect any trick or fraud themselves in the matter that both Mr. Glanvil himself who published the Narrative and Mr. Mompesson in whose house these wonderful things happened had confessed the whole matter to be a Cheat and Imposture And they were so diligent in spreading abroad this gross untruth that it went currant in all the three Kingdoms of England Scotland and Ireland An egregious discovery of what kind of Spirit this sort of men are which as I said though it be not for me to take notice of yet I will not stick to signifie it being both for mine own Interest and the Interest of Truth that those Reports raised touching Mr. Glanvil and Mr. Mompesson are by the present Edition of this Book demonstrated to be false to all the world That concerning Mr. Glanvil by his Preface to the second Part of the Book That touching Mr. Mompesson by two Letters of his own the one to Mr. Glanvil the other to my self which are subjoyned to the said Preface Which thing alone may justly be deemed to add a very great weight to the value as of that Story so of this present Edition But I will not upon pretence of exciting thy Appetite keep thee from the satisfying it by an overlong Preface which yet if it may seem to be defective in any thing the Doctors Letter where amongst other things you shall meet with that famous and well-attested story of the Apparition of Anne Walker's Ghost to the Miller will I hope make an abundant supply I shall add nothing more my self but that I am Your humble Servant J. C. Dr. H. M. his LETTER WITH THE POSTSCRIPT To Mr. J. G. Minding him of the great Expedience and Usefulness of his new intended Edition of the Daemon of Tedworth and briefly representing to him the marvellous weakness and gullerie of Mr. Webster's Display of Witchcraft SIR WHen I was last at London I called on your Book-seller to know in what forwardness this new intended Impression of the story of the Daemon of Tedworth was which will undeceive the world touching that Fame generally spread abroad as if Mr. Mompesson and your self had acknowledged the business to have been a
the Platonick Hypothesis That Spirits are embodied upon which indeed a great part of my Discourse is grounded And therefore I hold my self obliged to a short account of that supposal It seems then to me very probable from the nature of Sense and Analogy of Nature For 1 we perceive in our selves that all Sense is caused and excited by motion made in matter and when those motions which convey sensible impressions to the Brain the Seat of Sense are intercepted Sense is lost So that if we suppose Spirits perfectly to be disjoyn'd from all matter 't is not conceivable how they can have the sense of any thing For how material Objects should any way be perceived or felt without vital union with matter 't is not possible to imagine Nor doth it 2 seem suitable to the Analogy of Nature which useth not to make precipitious leaps from one thing to another but usually proceeds by orderly steps and gradations whereas were there no order of Beings between Us who are so deeply plunged into the grossest matter and pure unbodied Spirits 't were a mighty jump in Nature Since then the greatest part of the world consists of the finer portions of matter and our own Souls are immediately united unto these 't is infinitely probable to conjecture that the nearer Orders of Spirits are vitally joyned to such Bodies and so Nature by degrees ascending still by the more refin'd and subtile matter gets at last to the pure 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or immaterial minds which the Platonists made the highest Order of created Beings But of this I have discoursed elsewhere and have said thus much of it at present because it will enable me to add another Reason of the unfrequency of Apparitions and Compacts viz. 3 Because 't is very likely that these Regions are very unsuitable and disproportion'd to the frame and temper of their Senses and Bodies so that perhaps the courser Spirits can no more bear the Air of our World than Bats and Owls can the brightest Beams of Day Nor can the purer and better any more endure the noisom steams and poysonous reeks of this Dunghil Earth than the delicate can bear a confinement in nasty Dungeons and the foul squalid Caverns of uncomfortable Darkness So that 't is no more wonder that the better Spirits no oftner appear than that men are not more frequently in the dark Hollows under ground Nor is 't any more strange that evil Spirits so rarely visit us than that Fishes do not ordinarily sly in the Air as 't is said one sort of them doth or that we see not the Batt daily fluttering in the Beams of the Sun And now by the help of what I have spoken under this Head I am provided with some things wherewith to disable another Objection which I thus propose SECT XII XI XI IF THERE be such an intercourse between Evil Spirits and the Wicked How comes it about that there is no correspondence between Good Angels and the Vertuous since without doubt these are as desirous to propagate the Spirit and designs of the upper and better World as those are to promote the Interest of the Kingdom of Darkness WHICH way of arguing is still from our Ignorance of the State and Government of the other World which must be confest and may without prejudice to the Proposition I defend But particularly I say 1 That we have ground enough to believe that good Spirits do interpose in yea and govern our Affairs For that there is a Providence reaching from Heaven to Earth is generally acknowledged but that this supposeth all things to be ordered by the immediate influence and interposal of the Supream Deity some think is not very Philosophical to suppose since if we judge by the Analogy of the natural World all things we see are carried on by the Ministery of second Causes and intermediate Agents And it doth not seem so magnificent and becoming an apprehension of the Supream Numen to fancy his immediate hand in every trivial Management But 't is exceeding likely to conjecture that much of the Government of us and our Affairs is committed to the better Spirits with a due subordination and subserviency to the Will of the chief Rector of the Universe And 't is not absurd to believe that there is a Government runs from highest to lowest the better and more perfect Orders of Being still ruling the inferiour and less perfect So that some one would fancy that perhaps the Angels may manage us as we do the Creatures that God and Nature have placed under our Empire and Dominion But however that is That God rules the lower World by the Ministery of Angels is very consonant to the sacred Oracles Thus Deut. XXXII 8 9. When the most High divided the Nations their Inheritance when he separated the sons of Adam he set the bounds of the people 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the number of the Angels of God as the Septuagint renders it the Authority of which Translation is abundantly credited and asserted by its being quoted in the New Testament without notice of the Hebrew Text even there where it differs from it as Learned men have observed We know also that Angels were very familiar with the Patriarchs of old and Jacob's Ladder is a Mystery which imports their ministring in the affairs of the Lower World Thus Origen and others understand that to be spoken by the Presidential Angels Jerem. LI. 9. We would have healed BABYLON but she is not healed forsake her and let us go Like the Voice heard in the Temple before the taking of Jerusalem by Titus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And before Nebuchadnezzar was sent to learn Wisdom and Religion among the Beasts He sees a Watcher according to the 70. an Angel and an holy One come down from Heaven Dan. IV. 13. who pronounceth the sad Decree against Him and calls it the Decree of the Watchers who very probably were the Guardian-Genii of Himself and his Kingdom And that there are particular Angels that have the special Rule and Government of particular Kingdoms Provinces Cities yea and of Persons I know nothing that can make improbable The instance is notorious in Daniel of the Angels of Persia and Graecia that hindred the other that was engaged for the concerns of Judaea yea our Saviour himself tells us that Children have their Angels and the Congregation of Disciples supposed that St. Peter had his Which things if they be granted the good Spirits have not so little to do with us and our matters as is generally believed And perhaps it would not be absurd if we referr'd many of the strange thwarts and unexpected events the disappointments and lucky co-incidences that befal us the unaccountable fortunes and successes that attend some lucky men and the unhappy fates that dog others that seem born to be miserable the Fame and Favour that still waits on some without any conceivable motive to allure it and the general neglect
which we call a Fancy or Imagination and if the evidence of the outward senses be shut out by sleep or melancholy in either case we believe those representations to be real and external transactions when they are onely within our heads Thus it is in Enthusiasms and Dreams And besides these causes of the motions which sâ—…ir imagination there is little doubt but that Spirits good or bad can so move the instruments of sense in the brain as to awake such imaginations as they have a mind to excite and the imagination having a mighty influence upon the affections and they upon the will and external actions 't is very easie to conceive how good Angels may stir us up to Religion and Vertue and the Evil ones tempt us to Lewdness and vice viz. by representments that they make upon the stage of imagination which invite our affections and allure though they cannot compel our wills This I take to be an intelligible account of temptations and also of Angelical encouragements and perhaps this is the onely way of immediate influence that the Spirits of the other world have upon us And by it 't is easie to give an account of Dreams both Monitory and Temperamental Enthusiasms Fanatick Ecstasies and the like as I suggested Thus Sir to the FIRST But the other pretence also must be examined SECT XX. 2 MIRACLES are ceast therefore the presumed actions of Witchcraft are tales and illusions To make a due return to this we must consider a great and difficult Problem which is What is a real Miracle And for answer to this weighty Question I think 1. THAT it is not the strangeness or unaccountableness of the thing done simply from whence we are to conclude a Miracle For then we are so to account of all the Magnalia of Nature and all the Mysteries of those honest Arts which we do not understand Nor 2 is this the Criterion of a Miracle That it is an action or event beyond all natural powers for we are ignorant of the extent and bounds of Natures sphere and possibilities And if this were the character and essential mark of a Miracle we could not know what was so except we could determine the extent of natural causalities and six their bounds and be able to say to Nature Hitherto canst thou go and no further And he that makes this his measure whereby to judge a Miracle is himself the greatest Miracle of knowledge or immodesty Besides though an essect may transcend really all the powers of meer nature yet there is a world of spirits that must be taken into our account And as to them also I say 3 Every thing is not a Miracle that is done by Agents supernatural There is no doubt but that evil Spirits can make wonderful combinations of natural causes and perhaps perform many things immediately which are prodigious and beyond the longest line of Nature but yet These are not therefore to be called Miracles for THEY are SACRED WONDERS and suppose the POWER to be DIVINE But how shall the power be known to be so when we so little understand the capacities and extent of the abilities of lower Agents The Answer to this Question will discover the Criterion of Miracles which must be supposed to have all the former particulars They are unaccountable beyond the powers of meer nature and done by Agents supernatural and to these must be superadded 4 That they have peculiar circumstances that speak them of a divine Original Their mediate Authors declare them to be so and they are always persons of Simplicity Truth and Holiness void of Ambition and all secular Designs They seldom use Ceremonies or natural Applications and yet surmount all the activities of known Nature They work those wonders not to raise admiration or out of the vanity to be talkt of but to seal and confirm some divine Doctrine or Commission in which the good and happiness of the world is concern'd I say by such circumstances as these wonderful actions are known to be from a Divine cause and that makes and distinguisheth a Miracle And thus I am prepared for an Answer to the Objection to which I make this brief return That though WITCHES by their Confederate Spirit do those odd and astonishing things we believe of them yet are they no Miracles there being evidence enough from the badness of their Lives and the ridiculous Ceremonies of their performances from their malice and mischievous designs that the POWER that works and the end for which those things are done is not Divine but Diabolical And by singular providence they are not ordinarily permitted as much as to pretend to any new sacred Discoveries in matters of Religion or to act any thing for confirmation of doctrinal Impostures So that whether Miracles are ceased or not these are none And that such Miracles as are onely strange and unaccountable performances above the common methods of Art or Nature are not ceas'd we have a late great Evidence in the famous GREATRAK concerning whom it will not be impertinent to add the following Account which I had in a Letter from the Reverend Dr. R. Dean of C. a person of great veracity and a Philosopher This learned Gentleman then is pleased thus to write THE great discourse now at the Coffee-houses and every where is about Mr. G. the famous Irish Stroker concerning whom it is like you expect an account from me He undergoes various censures here some take him to be a Conjurer and some an Impostor but others again adore him as an Apostle I confess I think the man is free from all design of a very agreeable Conversation not addicted to any Vice nor to any Sect or Party but is I believe a sincere Protestant I was three weeks together with him at my Lord Conwayes and saw him I think lay his hands upon a thousand persons and really there is something in it more than ordinary but I am convinc'd it is not miraculous I have seen pains strangely sly before his hand till he hath chased them out of the Body Dimness cleared and Deafness cured by his touch Twenty persons at several times in fits of the Falling Sickness were in two or three minutes brought to themselves so as to tell where their pain was and then he hath pursued it till he hath driven it out at some extream part Running Sores of the Kings Evil dried up and Kernels brought to a Suppuration by his hand grievous Sores of many moneths date in few days healed Obstructions and Stoppings removed Cancerous Knots in the Breast dissolved c. But yet I have many reasons to perswade me that nothing of all this is miraculous He pretends not to give Testimony to any Doctrine the manner of his Operation speaks it to be natural the Cure seldom succeeds without reiterated touches his Patients often relapse he fails frequently he can do nothing where there is any decay in Nature and many Distempers are not at all obedient to
the House in clear nights and nothing visible the shaking of the Floor and strongest parts of the House in still and calm nights with several other things of the like nature And that by other Evidence it was applied to him For some going out of these parts to Gloucester whilst he was there in Prison and visiting him he ask't them what News in Wilts To which they replyed they knew none No says the Drummer did you not hear of a Gentlemans House that was troubled with the Beating of Drums They told him again if that were News they heard enough of that Ay says the Drummer it was because he took my Drum from me if he had not taken away my Drum that trouble had never befallen him and he shall never have his quiet again till I have my Drum or satisfaction from him This was deposed by one Thomas Avis Servant to one Mr. Thomas Sadler of North-Wilts and these words had like to have cost the Drummer his Life For else although the things were never so true it could not have been rightly applyed to him more than to another I should only add that the before mentioned Witnesses were Neighbours and deposed that they heard and saw these things almost every day or night for many Moneths together As to the Sculpture you intend you best understand the advantage I think it needless And those Words you shall have Drumming enough is more than I heard him speak I rest Your Loving Friend Jo. Mompesson Tedworth Aug. 8. 1674. An Introduction to the Proof of the Existence of Apparitions Spirits and Witches SECT I. The great usefulness and seasonableness of the present Argument touching Witches and Apparitions in subservieney to Religion THe Question whether there are witches or not is not matter of vain Speculation or of indifferent Moment but an Inquiry of very great and weighty Importance For on the resolution of it depends the Authority and just Execution of some of our Laws and which is more our Religion in its main Doctrines is nearly concerned There is no one that is not very much a stranger to the World but knows how Atheisme and Infidelity have advanced in our days and how openly they now dare to shew themselves in Asserting and Disputing their vile Cause Particularly the distinction of the Soul from the Body the Being of Spirits and a Future Life are Assertions extreamly despised and opposed by the Men of this sort and if we lose those Articles all Religion comes to nothing They are clearly and fully Asserted in the Sacred Oracles but those Wits have laid aside these Divine Writings They are proved by the best Philosophy and highest Reason but the Unbelievers divers of them are too shallow to be capable of such proofs and the more subtle are ready to Scepticize away those grounds But there is one Head of Arguments that troubles them much and that is the Topick of Witches and Apparitions If such there are it is a sensible proof of Spirits and another Life an Argument of more direct force than any Speculations or Abstract reasonings and such an one as meets with all the sorts of Infidels On which account they labour with all their might to perswade themselves and others that Witches and Apparitions are but Melancholick Dreams or crafty Impostures and here it is generally that they begin with the young-men whose understandings they design to Debauch They expose and deride all Relations of Spirits and Witchcraft and furnish them with some little Arguments or rather Colours against their Existence And youth is very ready to entertain such Opinions as will help them to phansie they are wiser than the generality of Men. And when they have once swallowed this Opinion and are sure there are no Witches nor Apparitions they are prepared for the denial of Spirits a Life to come and all the other Principles of Religion So that I think it will be a considerable and very seasonable service to it fully to debate and settle this matter which I shall endeavour in the following sheets and I hope so as not to impose upon my self or others by empty Rhetorications fabulous Relations or Sophistical Reasonings but treat on the Question with that freedom and plainness that becomes one that is neither fond fanciful nor credulous SECT II. The true stating of the Question by defining what a Witch and Witchcraft is I Know that a great part of the Labour in most Controversies useth to be bestowed on things impertinent to the main business and by them the Minds of both sides are so confounded that they wander widely from the point in difference and at last lose it quite It would quickly be thus in the Question of Witchcraft and usually is so without previous care to avoid it But I shall take the best I can that my pains on this Subject be not so mis-bestowed but closely applyed to the purpose And in order thereunto shall briefly define the terms of the Question and then set down what I grant to mine Adversaries and what I demand from them And when these Preliminaries are well adjusted we shall proceed with more distinctness and still see whereabout we are and know how far what is affirmed or proved reaches the main matter in debate The Question is whether there are Witches or not Mr. Webster accuseth the Writers on the Subject of defect in not laying down a perfect Description of a Witch or Witchcraft or explaining what they mean p. 20. What his perfect Description is I do not know but I think I have described a Witch or Witchcraft in my Considerations sufficiently to be understood and the Conception which I and I think most Men have is That a Witch is one who can do or seems to do strange things beyond the known Power of Art and ordinary Nature by vertue of a Confederacy with Evil Spirits Strange Things not Miracles these are the extraordinary Effects of Divine Power known and distinguished by their circumstances as I shall shew in due place The strange things are really performed and are not all Impostures and Delusions The Witch occasions but is not the Principal Efficient she seems to do it but the Spirit performs the wonder sometimes immediately as in Transportations and Possessions sometimes by applying other Natural Causes as in raising Storms and inflicting Diseases sometimes using the Witch as an Instrument and either by the Eyes or Touch conveying Malign Influences And these things are done by vertue of a Covenant or Compact betwixt the Witch and an Evil Spirit A Spirit viz. an Intelligent Creature of the Invisible World whether one of the Evil Angels called Devils or an Inferiour Daemon or Spirit or a wicked Soul departed but one that is able and ready for mischief and whether altogether Incorporeal or not appertains not to this Question SECT III. That neither the Notation of the Name that signifies indifferently nor the false Additions of others to the Notion of a Witch can any way