Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft | by Walter Scott

This is a series of essays by Sir Walter Scott on the subject of the witch-craze, demonology, and other occult topics To J. G. Lockhart, Esq.

Title	Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft
Author	Walter Scott
Publisher	William Tegg & Co.
Year	1830
Copyright	1830, William Tegg & Co.
Amazon	Letters On Demonology & Witchcraft

Demonology And Witchcraft 4

Demonology And Witchcraft

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First Letter: Origin of the general Opinions respecting Demonology among Mankind—The Belief in the Immortality of the Soul is the main inducement to credit its occasional reappearance—The Philosophical Objections t...

First Letter. Part 2: Enthusiastic feelings of an impressive and solemn nature occur both in private and public life, which seem to add ocular testimony to an intercourse betwixt earth and the world beyond it. For example,...

First Letter. Part 3: But it is not private life alone, or that tenor of thought which has been depressed into melancholy by gloomy anticipations respecting the future, which disposes the mind to midday fantasies, or to ni...

First Letter. Part 4: In the year 1686, in the months of June and July, says the honest chronicler, many yet alive can witness, that about the Crossford Boat, two miles beneath Lanark, especially at the Mains, on the ...

First Letter. Part 5: More than one learned physician, who have given their attestations to the existence of this most distressing complaint, have agreed that it actually occurs, and is occasioned by different causes. The ...

First Letter. Part 6: The case of Nicolai has unquestionably been that of many whose love of science has not been able to overcome their natural reluctance to communicate to the public the particulars attending the visitat...

First Letter. Part 7: A second, and equally remarkable existence, was communicated to the author by the medical man under whose observation it fell, but who was, of course, desirous to keep private the name of the hero of ...

First Letter. Part 8: This personage, arrayed in a court dress, with bag and sword, tamboured waistcoat, and chapeaubras, glided beside me like the ghost of Beau Nash ; and whether in my own house or in another, ascended...

First Letter. Part 9: The first shall be the apparition of Maupertuis, to a brother professor in the Royal Society of Berlin. This extraordinary circumstance appeared in the Transactions of the Society, but it is thus s...

First Letter. Part 10: ' An yron man,........ .... made of yron mould.'—Fairy Queen. There is every reason to believe that instances of this kind are frequent among persons of a certain temperament ; and when such oc...

First Letter. Part 11: It must also be remembered, that to the auricular deceptions practised by the means of ventriloquism or otherwise, may be traced many of the most successful impostures which credulity has received as ...

First Letter. Part 12: * Most ancient authors who pretend to treat of the wonders of natural magic, give receipts for calling up phantoms. The lighting lamps fed by peculiar kinds of medicated oil, and the use of suffumigat...

Second Letter: Consequences of the Fall on the communication between Men and the Spiritual World—Effects of the Flood—Wizards of Pharaoh—Text in Exodus against Witches—The word Witch is by some said to mean merely ...

Second Letter. Part 2: Supposing the powers of the witch to be limited, in the time of Moses, to enquiries at some pretended deity or real evil spirit concerning future events, in what respect, may it be said, did such a cr...

Second Letter. Part 3: Embarrassed by such difficulties, another course of explanation has been resorted to, which, freed from some of the objections which attend the two extreme suppositions, is yet liable to others. It ha...

Second Letter. Part 4: With this observation we may conclude our brief remarks upon witchcraft, as the word occurs in the Scripture; and it now only remains to mention the nature of the demonology, which, as gathered from t...

Second Letter. Part 5: Fourthly, and on the other hand, abstaining with reverence from accounting ourselves judges of the actions of Omnipotence, we may safely conclude, that it was not his pleasure to employ in the executi...

Second Letter. Part 6: It must also be admitted, that in another most remarkable respect, the power of the enemy of mankind was rather enlarged than bridled or restrained, in consequence of the Saviour coming upon earth. It...

Second Letter. Part 7: We will, in a future part of this enquiry, endeavour to show that many of the particular articles of the popular belief respecting magic and witchcraft were derived from the opinions which the ancient...

Second Letter. Part 8: Other heathen nations, whose creeds could not have directly contributed to the system of demonology, because their manners and even their very existence were unknown when it was adopted, were neverthe...

Second Letter. Part 9: * On Bemarkable Mercies of Divine Providence. From another narrative, we are entitled to infer that the European wizard was held superior to the native sorcerer of North America. Among the numberle...

Third Letter: Creed of Zoroaster—received partially into most Heathen Nations —Instances among the Celtic Tribes of Scotland—Beltane Feast—Gudeman's Croft—Such abuses admitted into Christianity after the earlier Ag...

Third Letter. Part 2: * See Essay on the Subterranean Commonwealth, by Mr. Robeet Kieke, Minister of Aberfoyle. If, indeed, the laws of the empire could have been supposed to have had any influence over these fierce bar...

Third Letter. Part 3: In like manner, the Scottish, even of the better rank, avoid contracting marriage in the month of May, which genial season of flowers and breezes might, in other respects, appear so peculiarly favoura...

Third Letter. Part 4: There is a remarkable story in the Eyrbiggia Saga, (Historia Eyranorum,) giving the result of such a controversy between two of these gifted women, one of whom was determined on discovering and puttin...

Third Letter. Part 5: The Norsemen were the more prone to these superstitions, because it was a favourite fancy of theirs that, in many instances, the change from life to death altered the temper of the human spirit from b...

Third Letter. Part 6: * See Saxo Grammaticus, Hist. Dan. lib. v. It was not only with the spirits of the dead that the warlike people of the North made war without timidity, and successfully entered into suits of ejectm...

Third Letter. Part 7: The classical fiction, for example, of the satyrs, and other subordinate deities of wood and wild, whose power is rather delusive than formidable, and whose supernatural pranks intimate rather a wish ...

Fourth Letter: The Fairy Superstition is derived from different Sources—The Classical Worship of the Silvans, or Rural Deities, proved by Roman Altars discovered—The Gothic Duergar, or Dwarfs— supposed to be derived...

Fourth Letter. Part 2: According to the old Norse belief, these dwarfs form the current machinery of the northern Sagas, and their inferiority in size is represented as compensated by skill and wisdom superior to those of o...

Fourth Letter. Part 3: The same belief on these points obtained in Ireland. Glanville, in his Eighteenth Relation, tells us of the butler of a gentleman, a neighbour of the Earl of Orrery, who was sent to purchase cards. In...

Fourth Letter. Part 4: Of these early times we can know little; but it is singular to remark what light the traditions of Scotland throw upon the poetry of the Britons of Cumberland, then called Reged. Merlin Wyllt, or the ...

Fourth Letter. Part 5: Having thus instructed her lover, they journeyed on to the castle, and, entering by the kitchen, found themselves in the midst of such a festive scene as might become the mansion of a great feudal lor...

Fourth Letter. Part 6: * In this the author is in the same ignorance as his namesake Reginald, though having at least as many opportunities of information. ** In popular tradition, the name of Thomas the Rhymer was alway...

Fifth Letter: Those who dealt in fortune-telling, mystical cures by charms, and the like, often claimed an intercourse with Fairy Land—Hud-hart or Hudikin—Pitcairn's Scottish Criminal Trials—Story of Bessie Dunlop ...

Fifth Letter. Part 2: On the 8th November, 1576, Elizabeth or Bessie Dunlop, spouse to Andrew Jak, in Lyne, in the Barony of Dairy, Ayrshire, was accused of sorcery and witchcraft, and abuse of the people. Her answers to t...

Fifth Letter. Part 3: More minutely pressed upon the subject of her familiar, she said she had never known him while among the living, but was aware that the person so calling himself was one who had, in his lifetime, actu...

Fifth Letter. Part 4: The two poor women last mentioned are the more to * See Scottish Poems, edited by John G. Dalzell, p. 32L, be pitied, as, whether enthusiasts or impostors, they practised their supposed art exclusivel...

Fifth Letter. Part 5: Another instance of the skill of a sorcerer being traced to the instructions of the elves is found in the confession of John Stewart, called a vagabond, but professing skill in palmistry and jugglery,...

Fifth Letter. Part 6: * The title continues,— Among the Low Country Scots, as they are described by those who have the second sight, and now, to occasion farther enquiry, collected and compared by a circumspect enquirer r...

Fifth Letter. Part 7: The next morning the terrified widower carried a statement of his perplexity to Mr. Matthew Reid, the clergyman. This reverend person, besides being an excellent divine in other respects, was at the s...

Sixth Letter: Immediate Effect of Christianity on Articles of Popular Superstition—Chaucer's Account of the Roman Catholic Priests banishing the Fairies—Bishop Corbett imputes the same Effect to the Reformation—his...

Sixth Letter. Part 2: This William Chourne appears to have attended Dr. Corbett's party on the Iter Septentrionale, two of which were, and two desired to be, doctors but whether William was guide, friend, or domestic, s...

Sixth Letter. Part 3: Brown bread and herring cobb! Thy fat sides shall have many a bob! But beyond such playful malice, they had no desire to extend their resentment. The constant attendant upon the English fair...

Sixth Letter. Part 4: They might say to the theologist, Will you not believe in witches ? the Scriptures aver their existence ;—to the jurisconsult, Will you dispute the existence of a crime, against which our own statute-...

Sixth Letter. Part 5: By resorting to so subtle an argument, those who impugned the popular belief were obliged, with some inconsistency, to grant that witchcraft had existed, and might exist, only insisting that it was a ...

Seventh Letter: Penal Laics unpopular when rigidly exercised—Prosecution of Witches placed in the hand of Special Commissioners, ad inquirendum—Prosecution for Witchcraft not frequent in the elder Period of the Roman...

Seventh Letter. Part 2: To the same cause, about the same period, we may impute the trial of the Duchess of Gloucester, wife of the good Duke Humphrey, accused of consulting witches concerning the mode of compassing the deat...

Seventh Letter. Part 3: Delrio himself confesses that Franciscus Balduinus gives an account of the pretended punishment, but real persecution, of these Waldenses, in similar terms with Monstrelet, whose suspicions are disti...

Seventh Letter. Part 4: * Alciat. Parerg. Juris, lib. viii. cap. 22. ** Bart, de Spina, de Strigilibus. His story assumes the form of a narrative of a direct war between Satan on the one side, and the Royal Commissioners ...

Seventh Letter. Part 5: Instances occur in De Lancre's book of the trial and condemnation of persons accused of the crime of lycanthropy, a superstition which was chiefly current in France, but was known in other countries, ...

Seventh Letter. Part 6: The scene was the Swedish village of Mohra, in the province of Elfland, which district had probably its name from some remnant of ancient superstition. The delusion had come to a great height ere it r...

Seventh Letter. Part 7: Some attempts these witches had made to harm individuals on middle earth, but with little success. One old sorceress, indeed, attempted to strike a nail, given her by the devil for that purpose, into ...

Eighth Letter: The Effects of the Witch Superstition are to he traced in the Laws of a Kingdom—Usually punished in England as a Crime connected with Politics—Attempt at Murder for Witchcraft not in itself Capital—Tr...

Eighth Letter. Part 2: Two remarkable statutes were passed in the year 1541 ; one against false prophecies, the other against the act of conjuration, withchcraft, and sorcery, and, at the same time, against breaking and des...

Eighth Letter. Part 3: While Rome thus positively declared herself against witches and sorcerers, the Calvinists, in whose numbers must be included the greater part of the English Puritans, who, though they had not finally ...

Eighth Letter. Part 4: Such cases were not, however, limited to the ecclesiastics of Rome. We have already stated that, as extremes usually approach each other, the Dissenters, in their violent opposition to the Papists, ad...

Eighth Letter. Part 5: Smack ?' says the afflicted young lady; ' and what news do you bring ?' Smack, nothing abashed, informed her he came from fighting with Pluck ; the weapons, great cowl-staves—the scene, a ruinous bake...

Eighth Letter. Part 6: He thus expostulates with some of the better class that were eager for the prosecution:— I. What single fact of sorcery did this Jane Wenham do ? What charm did she use, or what act of witchcraft cou...

Eighth Letter. Part 7: How have I sate while piped the penBive wind, To hear thy harp, by British Fairfax strung; Prevailing poet, whose undoubting mind Believed the magic wonders which he sung ! Like Mr. Throgmorton,...

Eighth Letter. Part 8: There was now approaching a time when the law against witchcraft, sufficiently bloody in itself, was to be pushed to more violent extremities than the quiet scepticism of the Church of England clergy ...

Eighth Letter. Part 9: * This reproach is noticed in a very rare tract, which was bought at Mr. Lort's sale by the celebrated collector, Mr. Bindley, and is now in the author's possession. Its full title is, The Discovery...

Eighth Letter. Part 10: Hath not this present parliament A lieger to the devil sent, Fully empower^ to treat about Finding revolted -witches out ? And has he not within a year Hang'd threescore of them in one shire? Some o...

Eighth Letter. Part 11: * See the account of Sir T. Browne, in No. XIV. of the Family Library (Lives of British Physicians) p. 60. In France, where the mere will of the government could accomplish greater changes, the con...

Eighth Letter. Part 12: * Glanville's Collection of Relations. Such scenes happened frequently on the assizes while country gentlemen, like the excellent Sir Roger de Coverley, retained a private share in the terror with ...

Eighth Letter. Part 13: The Irish statute against witchcraft still exists, as it would seem. Nothing occurred in that kingdom which recommended its being formally annulled; but it is considered as obsolete; and, should so wi...

Eighth Letter. Part 14: This scene opened by the illness of two girls, a daughter and niece of Mr. Parvis, the minister of Salem, who fell under an affliction similar to that of the Goodwins. Their mouths were stopped, their...

Eighth Letter. Part 15: To this it must be added, that the congregation of Salem compelled Mr. Parvis, in whose family the disturbance had begun, and who, they alleged, was the person by whom it was most fiercely driven on i...

Ninth Letter: Scottish Trials—Earl of Mar—Lady Glammis—William Barton— Witches of Auldearn—Their Rites and Charms—Their Transformation into Hares—Satan's Severity towards them— Their Crimes—Sir George Mackenzie's^ ...

Ninth Letter. Part 2: As these witches were the countrywomen of the weird-sisters in Macbeth, the reader may be desirous to hear some of their spells, and of the poetry by which they were accompanied and enforced. They use...

Ninth Letter. Part 3: * Pining. ** We should read perhaps, limb and lire. *** Stubble. It only remains to suppose, that this wretched creature was under the dominion of some peculiar species of lunacy, to which a f...

Ninth Letter. Part 4: One celebrated mode of detecting witches, and torturing them at the same time, to draw forth confession, was, by running pins into their body, on pretence of discovering the devil's stigma, or mark, w...

Ninth Letter. Part 5: After this, he grew very famous through the country for his charming and curing of diseases in men and beasts, and turned a vagrant fellow like a jockie,* gaining meal, and flesh, and money by his c...

Ninth Letter. Part 6: Bessie Grahame had been committed, it would seem, under suspicions of no great weight, since the minister, after various conferences, found her defence so successful, that he actually pitied her hard ...

Ninth Letter. Part 7: The principal person implicated in these heretical and treasonable undertakings was one Agnes Sampson, or Samson, called the Wise Wife of Keith, and described by Archbishop Spottiswood, not as one of ...

Ninth Letter. Part 8: Cummer, gang ye before; cummer gang ye I Gif ye will not gang before, cummers, let me! After this choral exhibition, the music seems to have been rather imperfect, the number of dancers conside...

Ninth Letter. Part 9: When, under these auspices, the ship was absent on her voyage, a vagabond fellow, named John Stewart, pretending to have knowledge of jugglery, and to possess the power of a spaeman, came to the resid...

Ninth Letter. Part 10: The scene began to thicken, for a commission was granted for the trial of the two remaining persons accused, namely, Stewart the juggler, and Margaret Barclay. The day of trial being arrived, the foll...

Ninth Letter. Part 11: The jury unmoved by these affecting circumstances, proceeded upon the principle that the confession of the accused could not be considered as made under the influence of torture, since the bars were n...

Ninth Letter. Part 12: The Scottish prelatists, upon whom the Covenanters used to throw many aspersions respecting their receiving proof against shot from the devil, and other infernal practices, rejoiced to have an opportu...

Ninth Letter. Part 13: * Law's Memorialls, edited by 0. K. Sharpe, Esq., Prefatory Notice, p. 93. The officers in the higher branches of the law dared now assert their official authority, and reserve for their own decisi...

Ninth Letter. Part 14: The last Scottish story with which I will trouble you, happened in or shortly after the year 1800, and the whole circumstances are well known to me. The dearth of the years in the end of the eighteent...

Tenth Letter: Other Mystic Arts independent of Witchcraft—Astrology—Its Influence during the 16th and 17th Centuries—Base Ignorance of those who practised it—Lilly's History of his Life and Times—Astrologers' Socie...

Tenth Letter. Part 2: Dr. Lamb, patronized by the Duke of Buckingham, who, like other overgrown favourites, was inclined to cherish astrology, was, in 1640, pulled to pieces in the City of London by the enraged populace, a...

Tenth Letter. Part 3: Of a meaner origin and occupation was the Scottish Brownie—already mentioned, as somewhat resembling Robin Goodfellow in the frolicsome days of Old England. This spirit was easily banished, or, as it ...

Tenth Letter. Part 4: The nearest approximation which can be generally made to exact evidence in this case, is the word of some individual who has had the story, it may be, from the person to whom it has happened, but most...

Tenth Letter. Part 5: Another such story, in which the name of a lady of condition is made use of as having seen an apparition in a country-seat in France, is so far better borne out than those I have mentioned, that I hav...

Tenth Letter. Part 6: The captain told the crew they must keep absolute silence on the subject of what had passed; and as the mate was not willing to give an explicit and absolute promise, he ordered him to be confined bel...

Tenth Letter. Part 7: Cases of this kind are numerous, and easily imagined, so I shall dwell on them no farther ; but rather advert to at least an equally abundant class of ghost stories, in which the apparition is pleased...

Tenth Letter. Part 8: The whole matter was, after the Restoration, discovered to be the trick of one of their own party who had attended the Commissioners as a clerk, under the name of Giles Sharp. This man, whose real nam...

Tenth Letter. Part 9: Many such impositions have been detected, and many others have been successfully concealed ; but to know what has been discovered in many instances, gives us the assurance of the ruling cause in all. ...

Tenth Letter. Part 10: There are other occasions in which the ghost story is rendered credible by some remarkable combination of circumstances very unlikely to have happened, and which no one could have supposed, unless som...

Tenth Letter. Part 11: There is also a large class of stories of this sort, where various secrets of Chemistry, of Acoustics, Ventriloquism, or other arts, have been either employed to dupe the spectators, or have tended to...

Tenth Letter. Part 12: Another species of deception affecting the credit of such supernatural communications, arises from the dexterity and skill of the authors who have made it their business to present such stories in the...

Tenth Letter. Part 13: So deep was the impression made by the story on the inhabitants of Mynehead, that it is said the tradition of Mrs. Leckie still remains in that port; and that mariners belonging to it often, amid temp...

Tenth Letter. Part 14: From this I am taught to infer that tales of ghosts and demonology are out of date at forty years and upwards ; that it is only in the morning of life that this feeling of superstition comes o'er us...

Note On A Passage In Sir Walter Scott's Demonology: The two verses referred to by Sir Walter in Deuteronomy evidently contain a summary of the Jewish offences in the cases of Witchcraft and Wizzardism, of which divination, xjt. predicting or prognostic...