ned in Scripture--punishing the innocent or letting the guilty
go free--by tracking guilt with well breathed sagacity, and
unravelling imposture with unerring skill;--a Jesuit had been
unkennelled, a spectacle as gratifying to a serious Protestant in
those days, as running down a fox to a thorough sportsman;--a plot had
been discovered which might have made Lancaster Castle "to topple on
its warders" and "slope its head to its foundations," and Master
Cowell, who had held so many inquests, to vanish without leaving
anything in his own person whereon an inquest could be holden;--a
pestilent nest of incorrigible witches had been dug out and rooted up,
and Pendle Hill placed under sanatory regulations;--and last, and not
least, as affording matter of pride and exultation to every loyal
subject, a commentary had at last been collected for two texts, which
had long called for some such support without finding it, King James's
_Demonology_, and his statute against witchcraft. When the
_Discoverie_ of Master Potts, with its rich treasury of illustrative
evidence, came to hand, would not the monarch be the happiest man in
his dominions!

Twenty years after the publication of the tract now reprinted, Pendle
Forest again became the scene of pretended witchcrafts; and from
various circumstances, the trial which took place then (in 1633) has
acquired even greater notoriety than the one which preceded it, though
no Master Potts could be found to transmit a report of the proceedings
in the second case, a deficiency which is greatly to be lamented. The
particulars are substantially comprised in the following examination,
which is given from the copy in Whitaker's _Whalley_, p. 213, which,
on comparison, is unquestionably more accurate than the other two
versions, in Webster, p. 347, and Baines's _Lancashire_, vol. i. p.
604:[40]--

[Footnote 40: The copy in Baines is from the Harl. MSS., cod. 6854,
fo. 26 _b_, and though inserted in his history as more correct than
that in Whitaker's Whalley, is so disfigured by errors, particularly
in the names of persons and places, as to be utterly unintelligible.
From what source Whitaker derived his transcript does not appear; for
the confession of Margaret Johnson he cites Dodsworth MSS. in Bodleian
Lib., vol. 61, p. 47.]

"THE EXAMINATION OF EDMUND ROBINSON,

"Son of _Edm. Robinson_, of _Pendle_ forest, mason,[41] taken at
_Padiham_ before _Richard Shuttleworth_[42] and _John Starkie_,[4