o the English crown,
the publication of such a work would not fail to induce a great amount
of attention to the subject dealt with. In 1603 he ascended the English
throne. His first parliament met on the 19th of March, 1604, and on the
27th of the same month a bill was brought into the House of Lords
dealing with the question of witchcraft. It was referred to a committee
of which twelve bishops were members; and this committee, after much
debating, came to the conclusion that the bill was imperfect. In
consequence of this a fresh one was drawn, and by the 9th of June a
statute had passed both Houses of Parliament, which enacted, among other
things, that "if any person shall practise or exercise any invocation or
conjuration of any evil or wicked spirit, or shall consult with,
entertain, feed, or reward any evil and wicked spirit,[3] or take up any
dead man, woman, or child out of his, her, or their grave ... or the
skin, bone, or any other part of any dead person to be employed or used
in any manner of witchcraft,[4] ... or shall ... practise ... any
witchcraft ... whereby any person shall be killed, wasted, pined, or
lamed in his or her body or any part thereof,[5] such offender shall
suffer the pains of death as felons, without benefit of clergy or
sanctuary." Hutchinson, in his "Essay on Witchcraft," published in 1720,
declares that this statute was framed expressly to meet the offences
exposed by the trials of 1590-1; but, although this cannot be
conclusively proved, yet it is not at all improbable that the hurry with
which the statute was passed into law immediately upon the accession of
James, would recall to the public mind the interest he had taken in
those trials in particular and the subject in general, and that
Shakspere producing, as nearly all the critics agree, his tragedy at
about this date, should draw upon his memory for the half-forgotten
details of those trials, and thus embody in "Macbeth" the allusions to
them that have been pointed out--much less accurately than he did in the
case of the Babington affair, because the facts had been far less
carefully recorded, and the time at which his attention had been called
to them far more remote.[6]

[Footnote 1: One copy of this reprint bears the name of W. Wright,
another that of Thomas Nelson. The full title is--

"Newes from Scotland,

"Declaring the damnable life of Doctor Fian, a notable Sorcerer, who was
burned at Edenborough in Januarie last, 1591;