inning of the fifteenth
century, many witches were burned in different parts of Europe. As a
natural consequence of the severe persecution, the crime, or the
pretenders to it, increased. Those who found themselves accused and
threatened with the penalties, if they happened to be persons of a bad and
malicious disposition, wished they had the power imputed to them, that
they might be revenged upon their persecutors. Numerous instances are upon
record of half-crazed persons being found muttering the spells which were
supposed to raise the evil one. When religion and law alike recognised the
crime, it is no wonder that the weak in reason and the strong in
imagination, especially when they were of a nervous temperament, fancied
themselves endued with the terrible powers of which all the world was
speaking. The belief of their neighbours did not lag behind their own, and
execution was the speedy consequence.

[Illustration: JOAN OF ARC.]

As the fear of witchcraft increased, the Catholic clergy strove to fix the
imputation of it upon those religious sects, the pioneers of the
Reformation, who began about this time to be formidable to the Church of
Rome. If a charge of heresy could not ensure their destruction, that of
sorcery and witchcraft never failed. In the year 1459, a devoted
congregation of the Waldenses at Arras, who used to repair at night to
worship God in their own manner in solitary places, fell victims to an
accusation of sorcery. It was rumoured in Arras that in the desert places
to which they retired the devil appeared before them in human form, and
read from a large book his laws and ordinances, to which they all promised
obedience; that he then distributed money and food among them, to bind
them to his service, which done, they gave themselves up to every species
of lewdness and debauchery. Upon these rumours several creditable persons
in Arras were seized and imprisoned, together with a number of decrepit
and idiotic old women. The rack, that convenient instrument for making the
accused confess any thing, was of course put in requisition. Monstrelet,
in his chronicle, says that they were tortured until some of them admitted
the truth of the whole accusations, and said, besides, that they had seen
and recognised in their nocturnal assemblies many persons of rank; many
prelates, seigneurs, governors of bailliages, and mayors of cities, being
such names as the examiners had themselves suggested to the victims.