when Ignorance and Superstition overspread the World, many severe Laws were made against Witches, by which, to the Disgrace of Humanity, great Numbers of innocent Persons, distressed with Poverty and Age, were brought to violent and untimely Ends.

The Witch-Act, a Disgrace to the Code of English Laws, was not repealed till the Year 1736!!!

Lord Verulam, that Sun of Science that rose upon our Island, and dispelled an hereditary Night of Ignorance and Superstition, gives us the following Reflections on Witches in the 10th Century of his Natural History: They form a fine Contrast to the narrow and bigotted Ideas of the royal Author of the Demonology.

"Men may not too rashly believe the Confession. of Witches, nor yet the Evidence against them: For the Witches themselves are imaginative, and believe oftentimes they do that which they do not: And People are credulous in that Point, and ready to impute Accidents and natural Operations to Witchcraft-It is worthy the observing, that both in antient and late Times (as in the Thessalian Witches deep and wide Hollow beneath Calton Hill, the Place where those imaginary Criminals, Witches and Sorcerers, were burnt in less enlightened Times.

The ingenious Artist Hogarth, in his Medley, represents with great Spirit of Satire, a Witch, sucked by a Cat, and flying on a Broomstick: It being said, as Trusler remarks, that the Familiar with whom a Witch converses, sucks her right Breast, in Shape of a little dun Cat, as smooth as a Mole, which, when it has sucked, the Witch is in a Kind of Trance. Vide Hogarth Moralized, p. 116. 2A2

and

and the Meetings of Witches that have been recorded by so many late Confessions) the great Wonders which they tell, of carrying in the Aire, transforming themselves into other Bodies, &c. are still reported to be wrought, not by Incantation or Ceremonies, but by Ointments and anointing themselves all over. This may justly move a Man to think that these Fables are the Effects of Imagination; for it is certain that Ointments do all (if they be laid on any Thing thick) by stopping of the Pores, shut in the Vapours, and send them to the Head extremely; and for the particular Ingredients of those magical Ointments, it is like they are opiate and soporiferous: For anointing of the Forehead, Neck, Feet, Back-bone, we know is used for procuring dead Sleeps. And if any Man say, that this Effect would be better done by inward Potions; Answer may be made, that the Medicines which go to the Ointments are so strong, that if they were used inwards, they would kill those that use them; and therefore they work potently though outwards." He tells us elsewhere;

"The Ointment, that Witches use, is reported to be made of the Fat of Children, digged out of their Graves'; of the Juices of Smallage*, Wolfe

* Olla autem omnium Maleficarum commune solet esse Instrumentum, quo succos, herbas, vermes et exta decoquant, atque ea venefica dape ignavos ad vota alliciunt, et instar bullientis ollæ, navium & equitum aut Cursorum excitant celeritatem. Olai Magni. Gent. Septent. Hist. Brev. p. 96. See also, for the Witches Pot or Caldron, Macbeth.

bane,

bane, and Cinque Foil, mingled with the Meat of fine Wheat: But I suppose that the soporiferous Medicines are likest to do it, which are Hen-bane, Hemlock, Mandrake, Moon-shade, Tobacco, Opium, Saffron, Poplar Leaves, &c."-Thus far that great Philosopher*.

The Sabbath of Witches is a nocturnal Assembly supposed to be held on Saturday, in which the Devil is said to appear in the Shape of a Goat, about · which they make several Dances and magic Ceremonies. In order to prepare themselves for this meeting, they take several soporific Drugs, after which they are fancied to fly up the Chimney, and to be spirited or carried through the Air, riding on a Switch to their Sabbath Assembly. Hence the Idea of Witches on Broomsticks, &c.t

A Cat

* There had been about the Time of Lord Verulam, no small Stir concerning Witchcraft.-Ben. Jonson, says Dr. Percy, has left us a Witch Song, which contains an Extract from the various Incantations of classic Antiquity. Some learned Wise-Acres had just before busied themselves on this Subject, with our British Solomon, James I. at their Head.-And these had so ransacked all Writers ancient and modern, and so blended and kneaded together the several Superstitions of different Times and Nations, that those of genuine English Growth could no longer be traced out and distinguished.

It was a supposed Remedy against Witchcraft to put some of the bewitched Person's Water, with a Quantity of Pins, Needles and Nails, into a Bottle, cork them up, and set them before the Fire, in order to confine the Spirit; but this sometimes did not prove sufficient, as it would often force the Cork out with a loud Noise, like that of a Pistol, and cast the Contents of the Bottle to a considerable Height.

Bewitched Persons are said to fall frequently into violent Fits, and vomit Needles, Pins, Stones, Nails, Stubbs, Wool and Straw, See Trusler's Hogarth moralized-Art. Medley.

The Author of the Gentle Shepherd, (a beautiful Pastoral in the
Scotch

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A Cat too is the "sine qua non" of a Witch :These Animals were antiently revered as Emblems of the Moon, and among the Egyptians were on that Account so highly honoured as to receive Sacrifices and Devotions, and had stately Temples erected

Scotch Language, that equals perhaps the Idyllia of Theocritus,) has made great Use of this Superstition.-He introduces a Clown telling the Powers of a Witch in the following Words:

"She can o'ercast the Night, and cloud the Moon,
"And mak the Deils obedient to her crune.
"At Midnight Hours o'er the Kirk-yards she raves,
And howks unchristen'd Weans out of their Graves;
"Boils up their Livers in a Warlock's Pow,
"Rins withershins about the Hemlock's Low;
"And seven Times does her Pray'rs backwards pray,
"Till Plotcock comes with Lumps of Lapland Clay,
"Mixt with the Venom of black Taids and Snakes;
"Of this unsonsy Pictures aft she makes
"Of ony ane she hates;and gars expire
"With slaw and racking Pains afore a Fire:
"Stuck fou of Prines, the devilish Pictures melt;
"The Pain by Fowk they represent is felt.

"And yonder's Mause

"She and her Cat sit beeking in her Yard," &c.

Afterwards he describes the ridiculous Opinions of the Country People, who never fail to surmise that the commonest natural Effects are produced from Causes that are supernatural:

"When last the Wind made Glaud a roofless Barn;
"When last the Burn bore down my Mither's Yarn;
"When Brawny elf-shot never mair came hame;
"When Tibby kirn'd, and there nae Butter came;
"When Bessy's Freetock's chuffy-cheeked Wean
"To a Fairy turn'd, and cou'd nae stand its lane;
"When Wattie wander'd ae Night thro' the Shaw.
"And tint himsel amaist amang the Snaw;

"When Mungo's Mare stood still and swat with Fright,
"When he brought East the Howdy under Night;
"When Bawsy shot to dead upon the Green,

"And Sarah tint a snood was nae mair seen;

"You, Lucky, gat the wyte of aw fell out,

"And ilka ane here dreads you round about, &c."

The

erected to their Honour. It is said that in whatever House a Cat died, all the Family shaved their Eye-brows. Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus relate, that a Roman happening accidentally to kill a Cat, the Mob immediately gathered about the House where he was, and neither the Entreaties of some principal Men sent by the King, nor the Fear of the Romans, with whom they were then negotiating a Peace, could save the Man's Life. Vide Bailey.

Hence no doubt they have been taken and adopted into the Species of Superstition under Consideration.

Mr. Strutt, in his Description of the Ordeals under the Saxons, tells us, "That the second Kind "of Ordeal by Water, was to thrust the accused "into a deep Water, whère, if he struggled in the "least to keep himself on the Surface, he was ac"counted Guilty; but if he remained on the Top "of the Water without Motion, he was acquitted

The old Woman in the subsequent Soliloquy gives us a philosophical Account of the People's Folly:

"Hard Luck, alake! when Foverty and Eild
"Weeds out of Fashion; and a lanely Bield,
"With a sma' Cast of Wiles, should in a Twitch,
"Gie ane the hatefu' Name, a wrinkled Witch.
"This fool imagines, as do mony sic,

"That I'm a Wretch in Compact with auld Nick,
"Because by Education I was taught,

"To speak and act aboon their common Thought."

This Pastoral, unfortunately for its Fame, is written in a Language but local, and not generally understood.-Had Mr. Addison known or could he have read this, how fine a Subject would it have afforded him on which to have displayed his inimitable Talent for Criticism!

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" with