ABSTRACT
Albeit witchcraft be the greatest of crimes, since it includes in it the grossest of heresies and blasphemies and treasons against God, in preferring to the Almighty his rebel and enemy, and in thinking the Devil worthier of being served and reverenced, and is accompanied with murder, poisoning, bestiality and other horrid crimes. Yet I conclude only from this that when witches are found guilty, they should be most severely punished, not with scourging and banishment, as the custom of Savoy was related to be by Gothofred . . . but by the most ignominious of deaths. Yet from the horridness of this crime I do conclude that of all crimes it requires the clearest relevancy and most convincing probation. And I condemn next to the witches themselves those cruel and too forward judges who burn persons by thousands as guilty of this crime, to whom I shall recommend these considerations:
I. That it is not presumable that any who hear of the kindness of God to men and of the Devil’s malice against them; of the rewards of Heaven and torments of Hell, would deliberately enter into the services of that wicked spirit; whom they know to have no riches to bestow, nor power to help, except it be allowed by permission, that he may tempt men: and that he being a liar from the beginning, his promises deserve no belief, especially since in no man’s experience he hath ever advantaged any person, whereas on the contrary his service hath brought all who entered in it to the stake.
