Malleus Malificarum, Part I
- (page 6)...and often it ordered that all their possessions should be
burnt, nor was anyone allowed to patronize or to consult them; very
often they were deported to some distant and deserted island and all
their goods sold by public auction. Moreover, those who consulted or
resorted to witches were punished with exile and the confiscation of
all their property.
- (page 6) ...And so they are to put to the torture in order to make
them confess. ..let him be racked. Nowadays they are burnt at the
stake, and probably this is because the majority of them are women.
- (page 6) ...The category in which women of this sort are to be ranked
is called the category of
Pythons,
persons in or by whom the devil
either speaks or performs some astonishing operation, and this is
often the first category in order. But the category under which
sorcerers come is called the category of Sorcerers.
- (page 7/8/?) ...these devils are able to collect various germs or
seeds. and from these germs or seeds they are able to cause various
species to grow.
- (page 8)-witches are changed into wolves.
- (page 11) ... we know that in days of old this veneration of the
stars led to the vilest idoltary.
- (page 12) ... Moreover, whatever a superior power is able to do,
it able to do without reference to a power superior to it, and a
superior power can all the more work without reference to an
inferiour power. But an inferior power can cause hailstorms and
bring about diseases without the help of a power greater than itself.
For Blessed Albertus Magnus in his work De Passionibus aeris
says that if rotten sage,
if used as he explains, and thrown into running water. will arouse
most fearful tempests and storms.
- (page 12) ... a man who commits a rape does this for the sake of
pleasure, not merely doing evil for evil's sake.
- (page 13) ..strange periapts, which they are wont to place under
the lintels of the doors of houses, or in those meadows where flocks
are herding, or even where men congregate.
- (page 14) ... they distract the minds of men, driving them to
madness, insane hatred, and inordinate lusts. These are they who by
the permission of God disturb the elements. who drive to distraction
the minds of men, such as have lost their trust in God and by the
terrible power of their evil spells, without any actual draught or
poison, kill human beings.
- (page 14) ...the human body is nobler than any other body
- (page 16) ...Idolatry, which is the first of all superstitions, as
Divination is the second, and the Observing of Times and Seasons the
third.
- (page 16) ...(of divination) there are three kinds of this
superstition: Necromancy, Astrology, or rather, Astromancy, the
superstitious observation of the stars, and Oneiromancy.
- (page 16) ...it was the devil alone who inspired him to study and
observed the stars.
- (page 17) ...harm may be wrought through fashioning images, through
the use of spells, and by the writing of mysterious characters.
- (page 17) ...at the sight of some impurity, such as, for example, a
woman during her monthly periods, the eyes will as it were contract a
certain impurity.
- (page 17) ...old women, then their disturbed spirit looks through
their eyes, for their countenances are most evil and harmful
- (page 17) ... With regard to operations of witchcraft, we find that
some of these may be due to mental influence over others, and in some
cases such mental influence might be a good one, but it is the motive
which makes it evil.
- (page 17) ...charms are of three kinds: the senses are deluded,
fascination may bring a certain glamour and a leading astray, there
may be a certain fascination cast by the eyes over another person.(?)
- (page 19) ... Or even let us conceive that if they superstitiously
employ natural things, as, for example, by writing down certain
characters or unkown names of some kind, and that then they use these
runes for restoring a person to health, or for inducing friendship,
or with some useful end, and not at all for doing any damage or harm,
in such cases, it may be granted, I say, that there is no express
invocation of demons; nevertheless it cannot be that these spells are
employed without a tacit invocation, wherefore all such charms must
be judged to be wholly unlawful.
- (page 19)
..there are four distinct species: A man may use such observations to
acquire certain knowledge: or he may in this way seek to inform
himself concerning lucky or unlucky days and things: or he may use
sacred words and parayers as a charm with no reference to their
meaning: or he may intend and desire to bring about some beneficial
change in some body.
- (page 20) ...The figures of demons and their names sometimes appear
in Astrological charts.
- (page 21) ... for it would seem that at certain times their semen
can more easily generate and beget children. Accordingly, we must
inquire why the demons should act at the conjunction of certain
stars, and beget children. ....they busy themselves by interfering
with the process of normal copulation and conception, by obtaining
human semen, and themselves transferring it.
- (page 22) ... However, to collect human semen from one person and to
transfer it to another implies certain local actions.
- (page 22) ...For all bodily and material things are on a lower scale
than pure and spiritual intelligences. But the angels, whether they
be good or whether they be evil, are pure and spiritual
intelligences. Therefore they can control what is below them.
- (page 24) ... that Satyrs and Fauns(which are commonly called
Incubi) have appeared to wanton women and have sought and obtained
coition with them. And that certain devils(which the Gauls called
Dusii) assiduously attempt and achieve this filthiness is vouched for
by so many credible witnesses that it would seem impudent to deny it.
....Blessed Gregory explains these to be woodland gods under another
name, not those which the Greeks called Pans, and the Latins Incubi.
Similarly, Blessed Isidore, in the last chapter of his 8th book,
says: Satyrs are they who are called Pans in Greek and Incubi in
Latin. And they are called Incubi from their practice of overlaying,
that is debauching. For they often lust lecherously after women, and
copulate with them; and the Gauls name them Dusii, because they are
diligent in this beastliness. But the devil which the common people
call an Incubus, the Romans called a fig Faun; to which Horace said,
"O Faunus, lover of fleeing nymphs, go gently over my lands and
smiling fields."
As to that of S. Paul in I. Corinthians xi, A woman ought to have a
covering on her head, because of the angels, many Catholics believe
that "because of the angels" refers to Incubi. Of the same opinion
is the Venerable Bede in his History of the English; also
William of Paris in his book De Uniuerso the last part of the
6th treatise.
- (page 25) ... If anyone wishes to study further the histories
concerning Incubi and Succubi, let him read (as has been said) Bede
in his History of English, and William and finally Thomas of Brabant
in his book About Bees.
- (page 25) ..and rejoice in all sin, especially in fornication and
idoltary, because by these are defiled the body and the soul, and the
whole man, which is called "the land".
- (page 26) ...But if it is asked why the devil is allowed to cast
spells upon the veneral act, rather than upon any other human act, it
is answered that many reasons are assigned by the Doctors, which will
be discussed later in the part concerning the divine permission. For
the present the reason that has been mentioned before must suffice,
namely, that the power of the devil lies in the privy parts of men.
For all struggles those are the hardest where the fight is continuous
and victory rare.
- (page 28) ... It is argued that just as in the computation of the
Good there are degrees and orders (see S. Augustine in his book on
the nature of the Good), so also the computation of the Evil is based
upon confusion. But as among the good Angels nothing can be without
order, so among the bad all is disorder, and therefore they all
indifferently follow these practices.
- (page 28) ... Secondly, it may be argued that semen has no power of
generation except as long as the heat of life is retained in it, and
that this must be lost when it is carried great distances. The
answer is that devils are able to store the semen safely, so that its
vital heat is not lost; or even that it cannot evaporate so easily on
account of the great speed at which they move by reason of the
superiority of the mover over the thing moved.
- (page 31) ...But it is submitted that the true source of witchraft is
the influence of the celestial bodies, and not devils.
- (page32) Unless indeed it be argued that this is a matter of
chance, from which it would follow that all human actions are
fortuitous, which is absurd.
- (page 35) ... Of these S. Isidore says that those who cast
Horoscopes are so called from their examination of the stars at
nativity, and are commonly called Mathematicians; and in the same
Book, chapter 2, he says that Fortune has her name from
fortuitousness, and is a sort of goddess who mocks human affairs in a
haphazard and fortuitous manner.
- (page 38) ... So all the works of witches are said to be miraculous
only inasmuch as they are done by some cause unknown to us, and
outside the order of created nature as known to us. From which it
follows that the corporeal virtue of a man cannot extend itself to
the causation of such works; for it has always this quality, that the
cause with the natural effect is, in the case of man, recognized
naturally and without wonder.
- (page 44) ... Women are intellectually like children.
- (page 46) ... The kingdom of the Romans endured much evil through
Cleopatra, Queen of Egypt, that worst of women.
- (page 47) ... Now there are, as it is said in the Papal Bull, seven
methods by which they infect with witchcraft the venereal act and the
conception of the womb: First, by inclining the minds of men to
inordinate passion; second, by obstructing their generative force;
third, by removing the members accommodated to that act; fourth, by
changing men into beasts by their magic art; fifth, by destroying the
generative force in women; sixth, by procuring abortion; seventh, by
offering children to devils, besides other animals and fruits of the
earth with which they work much harm.
- (page 56) ... And not, further, that the Canon speaks of loose
lovers who, to save their mistresses from shame, use contraceptives,
such as potions, or herbs that contravene nature, without any help
from devils. And such penitents are to be punished as homicides.
- (page 60) ... For there are three degrees of witches. For some both
heal and harm; some harm, but cannot heal; and some seem able only to
heal, that is, to take away injuries, as will be shown later.
- (page 62) ... It must not be omitted that certain wicked women,
perverted by Satan and seduced by the illusions and phantasms of
devils, believe and profess that they ride in the night hours on
certain beasts with
Diana
,
the heathen goddess, or with Herodias, and
with a countless number of women, and that in the untimely silence of
night they travel over great distances of land.
- (page 64) ... The devils run throughout the world and collect
various germs, and by using them can evolve various species. And the
gloss thereon says: When witches attempt to effect anything by the
invocation of devils, they run about the world and bring the semen of
those things which are in questions, and by its means, with the
permission of God, they produce new species.
- (page 65) ...For William of Paris tells of a certain man who thought
that he was turned into a wolf, and at certain times went into hiding
among the caves. The devil delights in such things, and caused the
illusion of the pagans who believed that men and old women were
changed into beasts.
- (page 66) ... No one does more harm to the Catholic faith than
midwives.
- (page 66) ... The Canonists treat more fully than the Theologians of
the obstructions due to witchcraft; and they say that is is
witchcraft, not only when anyone is unable to perform the carnal act,
of which we have spoken above; but also when a woman is prevented
from conceiving, or is made to miscarry after she has conceived. A
third and fourth method of witchcraft is when they have failed to
procure an abortion, and then either devour the child or offer it to
a devil.
- (page 66) ... Also, in one single year, which is the year now last
passed, he says that forty-one witches were burned, certain others
taking flight to the Lord Archduke of Austria, Sigismund. For
confirmation of this there are certain writings of John Nider in his
Formicarius,
- (page 68) ... And by reason of this ignorance, since witches are not
put down with the vengenance that is due to them, they seem now to be
depopulating the whole of Christianity.
- (page 69) ... For the providence of God is to be understood as
nothing else than the reason, that is, the cause of the ordering of
things to a purpose.
- (page 69) ... For is is necessary for the conservation of the
species that the death of one should be the preservation of another.
- (page 69) ... now that the world is cooling and declining to its
end;
- (page 70) ... the lower nature cannot of itself cause that effect without
the co-operation of the higher nature. For example, a gas
becomes ignited by fire; but it could not of its own nature light
itself without fire.
- (page 72) And that all these things happened instantaneously may be
exemplified by physical things; for the ignition of a gas, the
sight of the flame, and the impression formed by that sight all
happen at one and the same time.
- (page 77) ... The crimes of witches, then exceed the sins of all
others; and we now declare what punishment they deserve, whether as
heretics or as Apostates. Now Heretics, according to S. Raymund,
are punished in various ways, as by excommunication, deposition,
confiscation of their goods, and death. ...For, besides the
punishment of excommunication inflicted on them, Heretics, together
with their patrons, protectors and defenders, and with their children
to the second generation on the father's side, and to the first
degree on the mother's side, are admitted to no benefit or office of
the Church. And if a Heretic have Catholic children, for the
heinousness of his crime they are deprived of thier paternal
inheritance. And if a man be convicted, and refuse to be converted
and abjure his heresy, he must at once be burned, if he is a layman.
- (page77)...Then how much more emphatically do they speak concerning
witches, where they say that the penalty for them is the confiscation
of their goods and decapitation. The laws also say much concerning
those who by witchcraft provoke a woman to lust, or, conversely,
cohabit with beasts.
- (page 80) ... And the species of the first form of Divination, that
is, an open invocation of devils, are the following: Sorcery,
Oneiromancy, Necromancy, Oracles, Geomancy, Hydromancy, Aeromancy,
Pyromancy, and Soothsaying(). The species of the second kind are
Horoscopy, Haruspicy, Augury, Observation of Omens, Cheiromancy and
Spatulamancy.
- (page p80) ... For there are fourteen species of magic, springing
from the three kinds of Divination. The first of these three is open
invocation of devils. The second is no more than a silent
consideration of the disposition and movement of some thing, as of
the stars, or the days, or the hours, and such things. The third is
the consideration of some human act for the purpose of finding out
something that is hidden, and is called by the name of Sortilege.
- (page 81) ... The other species of divination, which are performed
with a tacit, but not an open, invocation of devils, are Horoscopy,
or Astrology, so called from the consideration of the stars at birth;
Haruspicy, which observes the days and hours; Augury, which observes
the behaviour and cries of birds; Omens, which observe the words of
men; and Cheiromancy, which observes the lines of the hand, or of the
paws of animals.
- (page 82) ...The workings of witches are never lawful.
- (page 86) .. In the second place, we must answer the question
why God permits witchcraft to affect the generative powers more than
any other human function. This has been dealt with above, under the
title, How witches can obstruct the generative powers and the veneral
act. For it is on account of the shamefulness of that act, and
because the original sin due to the guilt of our first parents is
inherited by means fo that act. It is symbolized also the serpent,
who was the first instrument of the devil.
- (page 87) ...First, why do not witches become rich? Secondly, why,
having the favour of princes, do they not co-operate for the
destruction of all their enemies? Thirdly, why are they unable
to injure Preachers and others who persecute them?
INDEX |
DATES |
PEOPLE |
BOOKS |
TORTURE |
ARTWORK |
WORDS |
MISCELLANEOUS |
joan@ucmb.ulb.ac.be