-The original, _Chasaph_, said to mean a person
who dealt in Poisons, often a Traffic of those who dealt with
familiar Spirits--But different from the European Witch of the
Middle Ages--Thus a Witch is not accessary to the Temptation of
Job--The Witch of the Hebrews probably did not rank higher than a
Divining Woman--Yet it was a Crime deserving the Doom of Death,
since it inferred the disowning of Jehovah's Supremacy--Other Texts
of Scripture, in like manner, refer to something corresponding more
with a Fortune-teller or Divining Woman than what is now called a
Witch--Example of the Witch of Endor--Account of her Meeting with
Saul--Supposed by some a mere Impostor--By others, a Sorceress
powerful enough to raise the Spirit of the Prophet by her own
Art--Difficulties attending both Positions--A middle Course adopted,
supposing that, as in the Case of Balak, the Almighty had, by
Exertion of His Will, substituted Samuel, or a good Spirit in his
Character, for the Deception which the Witch intended to
produce--Resumption of the Argument, showing that the Witch of Endor
signified something very different from the modern Ideas of
Witchcraft--The Witches mentioned in the New Testament are not less
different from modern Ideas than those of the Books of Moses, nor do
they appear to have possessed the Power ascribed to
Magicians--Articles of Faith which we may gather from Scripture on
this point--That there might be certain Powers permitted by the
Almighty to Inferior, and even Evil Spirits, is possible; and in
some sense the Gods of the Heathens might be accounted Demons--More
frequently, and in a general sense, they were but logs of wood,
without sense or power of any kind, and their worship founded on
imposture--Opinion that the Oracles were silenced at the Nativity
adopted by Milton--Cases of Demoniacs--The Incarnate Possessions
probably ceased at the same time as the intervention of
Miracles--Opinion of the Catholics--Result, that witchcraft, as the
Word is interpreted in the Middle Ages, neither occurs under the
Mosaic or Gospel Dispensation--It arose in the Ignorant Period, when
the Christians considered the Gods of the Mahommedan or Heathen
Nations as Fiends, and their Priests as Conjurers or
Wizards--Instance as to the Saracens, and among the Northern
Europeans yet unconverted--