Western Illinois Historical Review Vol. III, Spring 2011 ISSN ...modern witchcraft beliefs, as...

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Western Illinois Historical Review © 2011

Vol. III, Spring 2011

ISSN 2153-1714

‘Witchcraft is a rife and common sinne in these our daies’:

The Powers of Witches in English Demonologies, 1580-1620

Elizabeth Carlson

An increasing concern over the criminality of witchcraft and the persecution of accused

witches marked the early modern period of European history between 1450 and 1750. Scholars,

both past and present, have been intrigued about this period during which witchcraft was defined

as a secular crime and convicted witches were executed.1 Early modern people were beset by

concerns about political, religious, social, and economic disorder that stimulated their fears and

anxieties to create a situation that I term a “climate of fear.”2 This article examines English

demonologies authored by Reginald Scot, William Perkins, George Gifford, and Alexander

Roberts during the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries to identify both how a pervasive

climate of fear helped shape early modern witchcraft beliefs and how demonological treatises

contributed to the ongoing early modern dialogue about the connections between witchcraft and

fear.3 I contend that a detailed textual analysis of these works displays the complexity of early

1 Modern scholars have coined a number of terms for this time period, including the witch “craze” and the “Burning

Times,” reflecting a certain modern perception of the early modern world as superstitious, backward, ignorant, and

intolerant, traits revealed in part by the execution of individuals found guilty of witchcraft. For an historiographical

overview, see James Sharpe, Witchcraft in Early Modern England (Harlow, UK: Pearson Education, 2001),

“Introduction.”

2 For a further examination of the influence of this climate of fear on how early modern people in England explained

their world, especially in terms of the impact of supernatural powers on events, see Elizabeth Carlson, “Studying the

„Damned Art‟: Elite Demonologists and the Construction of Witchcraft in England, 1580-1620” (M.A. thesis,

Western Illinois University, 2010).

3 Demonologists authored demonologies, tracts concerning beliefs about demons (including the Devil) and human

agents of evil such as witches. Reginald Scot (1538-1599), published his Discoverie of Witchcraft without a license

23

modern witchcraft beliefs, as significant divergences among these authors‟ arguments

demonstrate that it is impossible to identify a single, “typical” English demonology, or to

conclude that “elite” ideas about early modern witchcraft were homogeneous and hegemonic.4

English demonologists did not begin writing on the subject of witchcraft until the second

half of the sixteenth century, by which time witchcraft had been established as a criminal act in

England. The most significant statute to define witchcraft as a crime passed in 1563 during the

reign of Elizabeth I.5 Another witchcraft statute passed in 1604 under James I added to the acts

of witchcraft classified as a capital felony in the Elizabethan statute. Most witchcraft cases were

tried in the state‟s assize circuit courts, held twice a year.6 At the assizes, juries presided over by

professional judges with legal training, themselves elites with divergent opinions regarding

witchcraft, evaluated the evidence presented and determined the guilt or innocence of the

accused.7 England, the geographic focus of this article, experienced a relatively small number of

in 1584. William Perkins‟s (1558-1602) A Discourse of the Damned Art of Witchcraft, So Farre Forth as it is

Revealed in the Scriptures, and Manifest by True Experience was published posthumously in 1608. George Gifford

(1547/8-1600) published two treatises on witchcraft: A Discourse of the Subtill Practises of Devilles by Witches and

Sorcerers (1587) and A Dialogue Concerning Witches and Witchcraftes (1593). Alexander Roberts (d. 1620)

published his Treatise of Witchcraft in 1616. For additional biographical and textual information, see the discussion

below. I selected these four authors because they produced early English demonological treatises that were easily

accessible in modern editions and (except for Roberts‟s text) published in multiple early modern editions.

4 Based on an examination of trial records, modern historian Robin Briggs observes similarly that “there is no such

thing as a „typical‟ witchcraft case.” Robin Briggs, “„Many Reasons Why‟: Witchcraft and the Problem of Multiple

Explanation,” in Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe: Studies in Culture and Belief, ed. Jonathan Barry, Marianne

Hester, and Gareth Roberts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 54. However, few scholars have

addressed the divergent opinions among elite demonologists.

5 The first statute outlawing witchcraft passed in 1542 during the reign of Henry VIII, but this unenforced statute

was repealed in 1547 under Edward VI. Sharpe, Witchcraft, 15-16.

6 England was divided into six assize circuit courts, and two judges traveled around these circuits twice a year, once

in summer and once in winter. See James Sharpe, Crime in Early Modern England, 1550-1750 (London: Longman,

1999), 32-33. Ecclesiastical courts could also try cases of witchcraft, particularly when they were related to litigation

concerning defamatory speech. England‟s central justice system differed from other regions of Europe where trials

were conducted by local authorities and local prejudices often influenced the outcomes.

7 Evidence in witchcraft trials typically consisted of testimony from witnesses and the accused. Judicial officials did

not subject accused witches to torture as part of the questioning process in early modern England, a policy

separating England from many continental states in terms of judicial practice.

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executions for witchcraft, perhaps linked to the lack of consensus concerning witchcraft beliefs

among elites.8

According to scholars who have investigated primary sources such as trial documents and

popular literature, early modern people, including elite demonologists, believed that witchcraft

could be manifested in a variety of ways. One of these manifestations involved a witch

perpetrating acts of maleficia, or harmful magic.9 A witch might also consort with evil spirits by

making a pact with the Devil or keeping a familiar, an evil spirit thought to do a witch‟s bidding

in return for sucking her blood. 10

Another manifestation of witchcraft could be engaging in

beneficent magic, or magical acts not harmful in nature. 11

Using supernatural powers to find lost

or stolen goods and curing maleficia served as examples of this type of magic.

In this article I have turned to an alternative set of primary sources, demonologies,

because such texts provide a broader sense of the conceptual framework within which early

8 The current scholarly consensus estimates that about 40,000 people were executed for witchcraft between about

1450 and 1750 throughout Europe. Sharpe, Witchcraft, 6. Sharpe notes that some commentators on witchcraft have

placed the number of witches as high as nine million. Recent scholarship has re-evaluated this count based upon an

increased survey of archival materials and more careful calculations based upon extant records which take the

limitations of available source material into account. England experienced only one large-scale witch hunt during

the turmoil of the English Civil War. See James Sharpe, “The Devil in East Anglia: The Matthew Hopkins Trials

Reconsidered,” in Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe: Studies in Culture and Belief, ed. Jonathan Barry, Marianne

Hester, and Gareth Roberts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 237-54.

9 Another manifestation claimed that a witch participated in a sabbat, a nocturnal gathering of witches. Descriptions

of sabbats are rare in English trial records and pamphlets, but more common in Scotland and some areas of

continental Europe.

10 The belief that a familiar spirit sucked a witch‟s blood prompted judicial officials to search a suspected witch‟s

body for the witch‟s mark, an unnatural protuberance or teat from which the familiar was thought to suckle.

Familiars are largely considered to be particular to England. For a discussion of familiar spirits in Germany, see

Edward Bever, The Realities of Witchcraft and Popular Magic in Early Modern Europe: Culture, Cognition, and

Everyday Life (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008); for a discussion of familiar spirits in England, see Emma

Wilby, “The Witch‟s Familiar and the Fairy in Early Modern England and Scotland,” Folklore 11, no. 2 (October

2000). http://www.jstor.org/stable/1260607 (accessed October 8, 2008); and Emma Wilby, Cunning Folk and

Familiar Spirits: Shamanistic Visionary Traditions in Early Modern British Witchcraft and Magic (Brighton,

England: Sussex Academic Press, 2005).

11 This type of magic can also be referred to cunning magic. See James Sharpe, Instruments of Darkness: Witchcraft

in Early Modern England (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1997), 66-70. For an example of a

prestigious cunning man, see Peter J. French, John Dee: the World of an Elizabethan Magus (London: Routledge

and K. Paul, 1972).

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modern people understood witchcraft. In contrast to the descriptive works discussed above,

demonological texts authored by literate elites are prescriptive pieces, focusing largely on the

theory rather than the practice of witchcraft. Such prescriptive materials formed an important

part of the intellectual milieu of early modern England. Since witchcraft beliefs, as they appear

in descriptive (and often polemical) texts such as trial testimony and pamphlets, were an

amalgamation of elite and popular beliefs, a study of elite beliefs as articulated in demonological

treatises is a pivotal means of understanding the legal, religious, and cultural frameworks of early

modern ideas about witchcraft. As Peter Elmer notes, “A close reading of the ideological

significance of witchcraft in early modern thought” is necessary to contextualize witchcraft

persecution, and demonological texts contribute to an understanding of this ideological

significance.12

The writings of the English demonologists considered within this article form part

of this corpus of elite beliefs since William Perkins, George Gifford, and Alexander Roberts

were clergymen and theologians while Reginald Scot was an educated country gentleman.

Among the issues which formed a part of the underlying framework concerning

witchcraft was how early modern people, including elite demonologists, understood the

operation of supernatural power. English demonologists grappled in their texts with questions

concerning the source of witches‟ powers and the extent of their abilities to cause injury.13

12

Peter Elmer, “Towards a Politics of Witchcraft in Early Modern England,” in Languages of Witchcraft: Narrative,

Ideology and Meaning in Early Modern Culture, ed. Stuart Clark (New York: St. Martin‟s Press, 2001), 103.

13 Current scholarship demonstrates that early modern people understood supernatural power in a manner that is

foreign to modern mentalities, including supernatural interventions in everyday life, some of which centered on

religious spirits, such as angels and demons, and others of which involved spirits such as fairies and imps, who had

the power to shape daily events and interact with humans. This belief in these daily interactions prompted the

practice of leaving gifts to encourage these spirits to be friendly rather than malicious. See Diane Purkiss, At the

Bottom of the Garden: A Dark History of Fairies, Hobgoblins, and Other Troublesome Things (New York: New

York University Press, 2000) 132. See also, for example, Emma Wilby, Cunning Folk and Familiar Spirit; Gary K.

Waite, Heresy, Magic, and Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003); Carlo

Ginzburg, The Night Battles: Witchcraft and Agrarian Cults in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, trans. John

and Anne Tedeschi (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983).

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Scholars contend that the main issue in understanding early modern witchcraft accusations and

beliefs is not the factual reality of witchcraft, but people‟s perceptions about its reality. Thus, if

one seeks to understand the early modern witchcraft phenomenon, one must start by figuring out

why early moderns, including demonologists from the educated elite, believed magical acts

affected the world around them. For these reasons, this article considers three interrelated issues

that received detailed treatment by English demonologists Scot, Perkins, Gifford, and Roberts in

their texts on witchcraft: the ability of individuals to draw on supernatural power to do harm, the

types of magical acts committed using this power, and the pact with the Devil as the source of

this power.14

One potential explanation for the early modern belief that witches could practice harmful

magic posits that belief in supernatural activity allowed people to explain events that were

otherwise incomprehensible.15

This interpretation finds support from the writings of Scot,

Perkins, Gifford, and Roberts. Despite disagreeing on the extent of supernatural powers able to

be exerted by a witch, Scot and Gifford both maintained that people used witches as scapegoats

to escape their own sense of guilt for unfortunate occurrences.16

Perkins noted that people‟s

curiosity to know more about the secret workings of the world led them to seek answers from the

14

Thus an examination of other points of convergence and divergence in these demonologies, including issues

concerning gender, politics, and authority is outside the scope of this article. For an examination of these topics, see

Carlson, “Studying the „Damned Art.‟”

15 A broad overview of this topic is provided in Sharpe, Witchcraft, 45.

16 On the scapegoating of witches, see Reginald Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, ed. Brinsley Nicholson (1584; repr.,

Totowa, NJ: Rowman and Littlefield, 1973), 1-3, 5-7; George Gifford, Discourse of the Subtill Practises of the

Devilles by Witches and Sorcerers (London: Toby Cooke, 1587), under “,”

http://digital.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=witch;idno=wit052 (accessed June 20, 2009); and George

Gifford, A Dialogue Concerning Witches and Witchcraftes, Shakespeare Association Facsimiles, 1 (1593, repr.,

Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1931), D3 v; An overview of the notion of scapegoating is explored by Brian

Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe (Harlow, UK: Pearson Longman, 2006), 154-59.

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Devil.17

Roberts‟s text indicates the acceptance of witchcraft as an explanation for otherwise

inexplicable events, notably mysterious illnesses and suspicious or unexpected deaths.18

Another explanation offered by scholars for early modern beliefs in witchcraft stemmed

from general, widespread fears concerning social, cultural, religious, economic, political, and

even environmental disorder. This idea is linked, in part, to the inexplicability of the processes of

the natural world in the pre-modern past. Martin Ingram notes that uncertainty surrounding the

causes of events (particularly illnesses and death) led to “persistent, perhaps powerful,

undercurrents of fears and beliefs about witchcraft.”19

Likewise, Stuart Clark highlights the need

for scholars to attend to these fears, noting that witchcraft prosecutions “become intelligible as

soon as we pay attention to the ordinary fears and anxieties, and ordinary beliefs and prejudices,

expressed by people in everyday situations.”20

Thus ordinary fears about such issues as disease,

economic crisis, and interpersonal tensions provided the groundwork for a belief in the existence

of witchcraft. When combined with the belief in the presence of capricious supernatural spirits,

these fears help explain how early modern people came to believe that malevolent neighbors

could access magical power to cause them harm.21

17

William Perkins, A Discourse of the Damned Art of Witchcraft, So Farre Forth as it is Revealed in the Scriptures,

and Manifest by True Experience (Cambridge: Cantrell Legge, 1608), under “Page 10-11,”

http://digital.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=witch;idno=wit075 (accessed October 13, 2008).

18 Alexander Roberts, A Treatise of Witchcraft (London: N. O. for Samuel Man, 1616), under “Page 23-24” and

“Page 55-59,” http://digital.library.cornell.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=witch;idno=wit171 (accessed June 20, 2009).

19 Martin Ingram, “From Reformation to Toleration: Popular Religious Cultures in England, 1540-1690,” in Popular

Culture in England, c.1500-1850, ed. Tim Harris (New York: St. Martin‟s Press, 1995), 106.

20 Stuart Clark, introduction, in Languages of Witchcraft: Narrative, Ideology and Meaning in Early Modern

Culture (New York: St. Martin‟s Press, 2001), 2.

21 Emma Wilby notes that witches‟ familiars and fairies could engage in both good and evil acts: “The majority of

fairies … were considered to be morally ambivalent, capable of both virtue and evil in varying proportions.” Emma

Wilby, “The Witch‟s Familiar and the Fairy,” 297-98; Lauren Kassell asserts that supernatural beings widely

categorized as fairies came in different types: “Wild ones lived in the woods and occasionally harmed (blasted)

people who came across them, and could be enticed into performing magic or sharing their secrets. Domestic fairies

were less powerful and less harmful, and punished people who did not keep their houses tidy and servants who

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A study of early modern published literature on the subject of witchcraft indicates that

elites, too, felt the effects of a pervasive climate of fear. In their evaluation of the ability of

individuals to access supernatural power, the acts of harmful magic they committed, and their

pact with the Devil, the four English demonologists examined here responded to underlying

concerns and uncertainty that centered less on explaining misfortunes and more on articulating

abstract ideas about God and the Devil. Perkins, Gifford, and Roberts, emphasized the power of

the Devil to tempt and corrupt people and used their texts to urge others to guard against falling

prey to the Devil. In his treatise on witchcraft, Reginald Scot, attempted to combat the fear of

witchcraft encouraged by the theologians to convince people that belief in witches attributed

divine power to a purported witch, a circumstance that angered God.

Commentary on the nature of God and the Devil thus formed a central component of

these authors‟ works. Each author devoted considerable energy to an explication of the exact

nature of the relationships among God, the Devil, and humans, perhaps because they perceived a

gap in the official teachings of the Church concerning such relationships. Establishing the

official theology of the Church of England during the English Reformation constituted a lengthy

process spanning the reigns of multiple monarchs, and because of this, English theologians

(especially adherents to various expressions of Protestantism) attempted to augment and

influence religious policy throughout the long English Reformation. A survey of the seminal

literature of the Elizabethan Church reveals no clear statement about witches or witchcraft. The

Book of Common Prayer (1559) included a number of prayers for a variety of sinners and

exhortations against a variety of sins (adultery, drunkenness, and disobedience) without

neglected their chores.” Lauren Kassell, “„All was this land full fill‟d of faerie,‟ or Magic and the Past in Early

Modern England,” Journal of the History of Ideas 67, no. 1 (January 2006): 118,

http://muse.jhu.edu.ezproxy.wiu.edu/journals/journal_of_the_history_of_ideas/v067/67.1kassell.pdf (accessed

October 8, 2008). See also Purkiss, At the Bottom of the Garden, 116-57.

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mentioning harmful magic.22

The Thirty-Nine Articles (1562) emphasized the importance of

homilies or sermon stories in teaching people faith. 23

However, the Elizabethan Homilies (1623)

included only one mention of witchcraft, in the Homily “Against Whoredom and Adultery”:

“And S. Iohn in his Reuelation saith, That whoremongers shall haue their part with murderers,

sorcerers, enchaunters, lyers, idolaters, and such other, in the lake which burneth with fire and

brimstone, which is the second death.”24

The lack of a Homily dedicated to the sin of witchcraft

probably alarmed preachers like Perkins, Gifford, and Roberts, whose works focus on the danger

that witches posed to the state, religion, and society. Thus, their treatises on witchcraft sought to

compensate for this omission from official doctrine.25

Reginald Scot‟s treatise demonstrates that an interest in theology was not confined to

22

The Prayer Book of Queen Elizabeth, 1559 (1559, repr., London: Griffith Farran Okeden & Welsh, 1890),

http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp/1559/BCP_1559.htm (accessed May 27, 2010).

23 The Victorian Web, “The 39 Articles of Religion,” The Victorian Web,

http://www.victorianweb.org/religion/39articles.html (accessed May 27, 2010).

24 “Homily Against Whoredom and Adultery,” Renaissance Electronic Texts 1.2, ed. Ian Lancashire (1623, repr.,

Toronto: University of Toronto, 1997): lines 441-444,

http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/ret/homilies/bk2hom21.html (accessed May 27, 2010). The Elizabethan

Homilies were sermons and prayers to be read during divine service as a means of providing theological instruction

to parishioners as well as imparting a broader sense of morality designed to ensure social and political order. The

Homilies were published as two separate books by 1571, but the first edition combining the two books with the

complete Homilies was published in 1623 during the reign of James I. All references to the Homilies in this article

come from the 1623 edition.

25 Both William Perkins and George Gifford wrote extensively on a variety of theological issues and witchcraft

treatises formed a part of their broader attempts to establish a comprehensive articulation of religious doctrine. In

addition to witchcraft, Perkins‟s approximately three dozen texts included works on scriptural exegesis (explaining

biblical passages), conscience, the Christian family, and how to live and die well. These works expressed his interest

in promoting the role of ministers in shaping the faith of their (ignorant) flocks, the common folk. Donald Wing,

Short-title catalogue of books printed in England, Scotland, Ireland, Wales, and British America, and of English

books printed in other countries, 1641-1700, 3 vols. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1945-51), s.v.,

“Perkins, William.” Hereafter, the citations to this text will follow scholarly convention and refer to Wing‟s

collection as the STC. Gifford also demonstrated his concern with ministering to common people as his

approximately twenty printed texts covered issues such as scriptural exegesis, heretics and papists, providence, and,

of course, witchcraft. The choice to write both a learned treatise on witchcraft (his Discourse) and a work that would

be accessible to a larger number of people (his Dialogue) suggests that he sought to influence both elites and

ordinary people. STC, s.v., “Gifford, George.” Alexander Roberts‟s sole publication was his treatise on witchcraft,

so it is difficult to access his broader theological positions and concerns or to analyze how his ideas about witchcraft

fit into his understandings of sin and temptation. STC, s.v., “Roberts, Alexander.”

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theologians. Scot‟s treatment of witchcraft rested on a decidedly unorthodox interpretation of the

relationships among God, the Devil, and humans, since he forcefully denied the reality of early

modern witchcraft, a position underpinned by his assertion that spirits could not assume

corporeal forms or operate in the human world. This interpretation stood in direct contrast to the

beliefs of most theologians that Devil and other spirits not only assumed physical forms but also

intervened directly in people‟s lives. Thus the concerns evident in Scot‟s work differed from the

concerns of Perkins, Gifford, and Roberts, who did subscribe to the belief that witchcraft was

real. The first two grounded witchcraft within their broader religious beliefs in the attempt to

create a comprehensive doctrine to prevent misinterpretations that could threaten religious

authority and conformity. All four authors did, however, caution against assigning too much

power to a human witch and sought to defend a proper distribution of authority and power,

though they disagreed upon the exact nature of this distribution. Scot rejected the attribution of

power to the Devil and spirits because he felt it risked denigrating God‟s power, while the three

theologians sought to emphasize the power of the Devil to work through witches, although

acknowledging that the Devil‟s authority was granted by God. A more detailed exploration of the

divergences within these works concerning the allocation of power among God, the Devil, and

human beings, as discussed below, provides support for the argument that no single “typical”

demonology existed in early modern England.

Possessing Supernatural Powers

Modern scholars have devoted considerable attention to the question of early modern

witches‟ purported powers and their alleged relationship with the Devil as the source of those

powers, as did their early modern predecessors. Deborah Willis argues that elite demonologists

in early modern England sought to shape popular beliefs by establishing a new link between

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witch and Devil.26

She contends that popular witchcraft beliefs held that witches sent out

fearsome spirits, similar to imps and fairies, to do their bidding and in return mothered them,

providing food and shelter. According to Willis, however, elite demonologists like Perkins and

Gifford stripped the witch of her power over these spirits by linking such familiar spirits to the

Devil. This arrangement altered the traditional popular understanding of authority involving

practitioners of magic by asserting that the Devil commanded the witch to do his bidding.27

In his Discoverie of Witchcraft, Reginald Scot denied that witches performed works of

wonder attributed to them by both common folk and learned writers.28

Only God‟s power (not a

witch‟s or the Devil‟s) produced supernatural acts. Scot argued that contemporary witches could

only practice cozening arts, which were essentially magic tricks. According to Scot, witchcraft

beliefs usurped God‟s power and granted it to the witch. He worried about the ramifications of

this usurpation, specifically, that through belief in witchcraft, “the name of God is abused,

prophaned [sic] and blasphemed, and his power attributed to a vile creature.”29

This conclusion

26

Deborah Willis, Malevolent Nurture: Witch-hunting and Maternal Power in Early Modern England (Ithaca:

Cornell University Press, 1995), chap. 3. Willis also asserts that accusations of witchcraft among common people

stemmed from concerns surrounding childbearing and childrearing. Accused witches were often suspected of

harming children by causing their illness or death, providing poor care when called upon to be caregivers, and

usurping the rightful place of a natural mother within the household. Thus, the most fearful characteristics and

behaviors of witches recorded in trial documents and pamphlets exemplify those of a bad mother. Willis suggests

that English demonologists, especially Perkins and Gifford, transformed the witch from a corrupted mother into a

corrupted servant of the Devil. See Willis, Malevolent Nurture, chap. 3.

27 Edward Bever posits that a person with a reputation as a witch could actually inflict damage upon his or her

neighbors through malicious words and intent, prompting the victim to suffer from psychosomatic disorders. Bever

notes the impact that curses could have on an individual who believes in the power contained within such words. He

asserts that purported witches wielded real psychological power against their victims. Edward Bever, The Realities

of Witchcraft, passim.

28 Scot extended the arguments that a witch has supernatural power to what he perceived as its logical conclusion:

“If either preests, divels, or witches could so doo, the divine power should be checked and outfaced by magicall

cunning, and Gods creatures made servile to a witches pleasure.” Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 176. He also

accused witchcraft believers of similar crimes to those imputed to witches: “He that attributeth to a witch, such

divine power, as dulie and onelie apperteineth unto God (which all witchmongers doo) is in hart a blasphemer, an

idolater, and full of grosse impietie.” Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 9.

29 Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 397. Quotations employed from the five demonologies considered in this article

will maintain early modern spelling and punctuation.

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seemed obvious to Scot since “all wisemen understand that witches miraculous enterprises, being

contrarie to nature, … are void of truth or possibilitie,” and “all Christians see, that to confesse

witches can doo as they saie, were to attribute to a creature the power of the Creator.”30

Those

who did so incurred God‟s wrath, since acts of witchcraft, like miracles, belonged to an earlier

time in history. In other words, Scot believed that those identified as witches in early modern

England were not the same as the ancient witches whose activities were recorded in the holy

books describing the early Christian tradition.31

Past instances of witchcraft and miracles had

been permitted by God in order to strengthen the foundations of Christian faith and therefore

were no longer necessary, since the faith had become well-established.

Scot maintained that suffering and hardship served as punishment and trials sent from

God, and attributing such acts to witches thus denied God this ability to correct people. When

misfortunes occurred, either someone was at fault, or the afflicted had incurred God‟s wrath. For

Scot, there were no real alternative explanations.32

As he demonstrated in his work, however,

people preferred to explain their misfortunes as the actions of witches as a means to escape their

own sense of guilt and responsibility. Essentially, Scot argued that witchcraft provided people

with a way to alleviate their fears that their own actions and decisions caused hardship. He

declared, “The fables of Witchcraft have taken so fast hold … in the heart of man, that fewe …

can (nowadaies) with patience indure the hand and correction of God. For if any adversitie …

30

Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 407.

31 Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 121-22. Scot used the Biblical witch of Endor as an example of an ancient witch

whom God allowed to use witchcraft to strengthen people‟s faith. He also cited apparitions of angels and Christ‟s

miracles as uses of supernatural power with the same purpose. Scot emphasized that all of these acts were no longer

possible.

32 Sharpe, Witchcraft, 45.

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happen unto them … they exclaime uppon witches.”33

Belief in witchcraft thus supported an

abdication of responsibility and a rejection of God‟s will. This dangerous belief was encouraged

by some ministers who “affirme that they have had in their parish … witches…. Whereby they

manifested as well their infidelitie and ignorance, in conceiving God‟s word; as their negligence

and error in instructing their flocks.”34

Thus Scot implicated clergymen like Perkins, Gifford, and

Roberts in adding to the dangers of witchcraft by propagating a climate of fear that allowed for

the abdication of personal responsibility.

While Scot rejected other writers‟ claims about the power of witchcraft, he offered his

own explanation for the acts apparently committed by witches. Witches could only create

illusions through “the nimble conveiance of the hand.”35

This exposure of so-called juggling

provided the heart of the discovery proclaimed in his title: Discoverie of Witchcraft; he explained

such tricks and exposed the props used to create such illusions. Thus Scot insisted that witches

could cleverly use natural powers to befuddle observers, who then might misinterpret such acts

as magic. According to Scot, true supernatural power could only be used by God. Jugglers

pretended to possess powers they could not have if they claimed to be using magic to perform

their tricks. Scot did not condemn the use of such cozening tricks, rather the pretensions of those

who claimed magical abilities. He condemned those who pretended to engage in magical acts

because they encouraged misinterpretations of divine power by others.

In contrast to Scot, William Perkins accepted that witches possessed supernatural powers.

Perkins argued that witches accomplished their works of wonder with the help of the Devil, since

33

Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 1. This assertion perhaps offers the greatest evidence for Scot‟s skepticism as he

chided people for taking the easy way out of personal responsibility.

34 Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 3.


34

such magical acts could not be accomplished by a human witch alone. Perkins acknowledged,

“Witchcraft is a rife and common sinne in these our daies, and very many are intangled with it,

beeing either practitioners thereof in their owne persons, or at the least, yeelding to seeke for

helpe and counsell of such as practise it.”36

Perkins defended this position against those, like

Scot, who argued that witchcraft was not a genuine threat. He asserted that “there be sundry men

who receive it for a truth, that Witchcraft is nothing else but a meere illusion, and … this opinion

takes place not onely with the ignorant, but is holden and maintained by such as are learned …

that there be no Witches.”37

For Perkins, the denial of witchcraft increased the likelihood of

being deluded by the Devil, the figure at the core of the practice of witchcraft. Indeed, witchcraft

required both the Devil‟s aid and God‟s permission: “Witchcraft is a wicked Art, serving for the

working of wonders, by the assistance of the Devil, so farre forth as God shall … permit.”38

Witches entered into a bargain with the Devil whereby they obtained the power to commit acts of

witchcraft.

Perkins contended that witchcraft thrived among people susceptible to the Devil‟s

temptations. The Devil preyed on people‟s discontent to convince them to engage in witchcraft.

Perkins attributed two main causes of witchcraft to original sin.39

He asserted that the first sin of

man was not a singular event, rather it “contained in it the breach of every Commandment of the

Morall Law.”40

Satan sought especially to encourage the sin of discontentment in man, and “this

36

Perkins, Discourse of the Damned Art, under “Page 9.” Perkins‟s style of capitalizing the words “Witchcraft” and

“Witch” throughout his treatise will be maintained in the quotations in this article.

37 Perkins, Discourse of the Damned Art, under “Page 9.” This may be a veiled reference to Scot.

38 Perkins, Discourse of the Damned Art, under “Page 9.”

39 Perkins‟s association of witchcraft and original sin suggests a connection between witchcraft and the fall of Eve,

and thus women.


35

sinne ... continually is derived from them to all their posterities, and now is become so common

... that there is scarce a man to bee found, who is not originally tainted therewith as he is a

man.”41

This sin manifested itself firstly “in mans [sic] outward estate,” especially when a

person„s impoverished material condition conflicted with his “love of himselfe, and an high

conceit of his own deserving.”42

The Devil exploited this attitude to convince a person to “bee

his vassal … in this wicked art, supposing that … he may be able in time to relieve his

povertie.”43

The second reason that people turned to the practice of witchcraft was “in the minde

and inward man; and that is curiositie.”44

Perkins asserted that men desired to know more about

the world around them than they were capable of knowing. The wonders practiced by witches

offered the possibility to extend knowledge through supernatural means.

George Gifford cautiously balanced the ideas espoused by both Perkins and Scot. He

asserted both that people incorrectly “believed that witches could do great wonders, ascribing

such power unto devils as belongeth onely to God” and that “all witchcraft … is no more but

either mere cosenage, or poisoning: so that in the opinion of these men, the devill hath never

done, nor can do any thing by witches and sorcerers.”45

For Gifford, the temptations of the Devil

ensnared people, especially witches. He observed that “many through ignorance … are greatly

overreached by Satan, and so entangled and snared with errors that they fal into very foule and

horrible sinnes.”46

Gifford, like Perkins, feared the Devil‟s power as the primary force driving

41

Perkins, Discourse of the Damned Art, under “Page 10.”




45 Gifford, Discourse, under “Page 5.”

46 Gifford, Discourse, under “Page 5.”

36

witchcraft. The Devil could make witches (and others) believe that they committed magical acts,

but this was just deceit. Gifford emphasized that God permitted the Devil to work through

witches to punish wicked people. Therefore, witches were “instrumentes of Gods [sic] vengance,

and executioners of his wrath.”47

He reiterated this point in his Dialogue: “God is provoked by

their sinnes to give the devil such instruments to work withal, but [they] rage against the witche,

even as if she could do all.”48

Here Gifford echoed Scot‟s argument that people used witchcraft

as a means to shift responsibility for the consequences of their actions.

Alexander Roberts also emphasized the reality of witchcraft. According to Roberts,

people like Scot “perswade themselues, and would induce others to be of the same minde, that

there be no Witches at all,” and believed instead that supposed witches were “melancholique,

aged, and ignorant Women, deluded in their imagination.”49

Roberts, like Perkins and Gifford,

stressed the importance of the Devil in witchcraft, and Roberts also argued that the Devil needed

God‟s permission to operate. Roberts asserted that “God giueth, both the diuell, and his seruants

the witches, power sometimes to trouble his owne children.”50

This permission from God was an

important component of witchcraft for both Perkins and Roberts because it prevented unorthodox

attacks on God‟s power and religious authority that could surface through a consideration of

witchcraft.

Theologians feared arguments such as Scot‟s would lead people astray, especially in the

absence of any official statement by the Church of England on the dangers of witches. Scot‟s

insistence that belief in witches‟ ability to commit supernatural acts usurped God‟s power

47

Gifford, Discourse, under “Page 22.”

48 Gifford, Dialogue, D3 v.

49 Roberts, Treatise of Witchcraft, under “Page 11.”


37

frightened the theologians, who believed Scot‟s ideas undermined the authority of religious

leaders and God himself. For these clergymen, the greatest danger posed by witchcraft was that

people would misinterpret the actions of witches, thereby turning away from God. Scot sought to

counteract the fear of witchcraft, while the other three writers warned people against the grave

consequences of rejecting its existence, demonstrating a major difference in the concerns

underlying their works. This significant divergence among the four authors supports the notion

that demonologies, which are often considered to represent elite opinions (and therefore often

juxtaposed collectively against popular opinions), are as complex and varied as individual witch

trials. No consensus existed among learned writers about the existence of witchcraft.51

Working Magic through the Devil’s Power

After establishing whether or not a person could access supernatural powers, each

demonologist considered both the source of those powers and the types of acts that could or

could not be committed using them. Magical acts constituted any action that required the use of

power beyond the bounds of nature. For the most part, these four demonologists focused on

potential acts of maleficia, or harmful magic. Scot maintained that magical acts could not be

committed by a witch. In general, the three theologians, Perkins, Gifford, and Roberts, agreed

that such harmful magic could be practiced after a purported witch made a pact with the Devil,

although they differed regarding the amount of power a witch could possess directly.

Reginald Scot denied the possibility that individuals could actually commit acts of magic

including the ability to uncover “things hidden and lost, and foreshew / things to come,” “raise

halie, tempests, and hurtfull weather,” “make a woman miscarrie in childbirth,” or even “with

51

For more on the intellectual discourse among English demonologists, see Ian Bostridge, Witchcraft and its

Transformations, c.1650-c.1750 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), 139-54; Stuart Clark, Thinking With Demons: The

Idea of Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), 195-213; Sharpe, Witchcraft, 77-82.

38

their looks kill either man or beast.”52

Scot rejected the notion that supposed witches could

engage in such magical acts following an agreement with the Devil, concluding that ordinary

people wrongly believed that witches could use magic to afflict those around them. He asserted

that “such maner of witchcrafts” were “false and fabulous” because “if all the witches in

England [were] burnt or hanged; I warrant you we should not faile to have raine, haile, and

tempests, as now we have.”53

Despite the falsity of witches‟ acts, those who were thought to

practice magic contributed to a false understanding of God‟s power. In Scot‟s view, “The

illusions of witches … are offensive to the majestie … of God.”54

When witches either claimed

to or were believed to possess supernatural powers, they infringed upon God‟s power. Scot

feared that such claims of witchcraft encouraged people to misapply God‟s power to a human

being, the purported witch. Thus, even untrue claims of witchcraft‟s efficacy detracted from a

proper understanding of the nature of the divine.

Another misunderstanding feared by Scot concerned the supposed source of a witch‟s

power: a bargain made with the Devil. Unlike the three theologians, Scot denied the possibility

of such an agreement. Scot asserted that “in estimation of the vulgar people, it [the pact] is …

contrived betweene a corporall old woman, and a spirituall devil,” although “there can be no

52

Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 7. Scot also noted that witches were thought to “devoure and eate yong children

and infants of their owne kind.” Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 7. The eating of infants is not discussed by any of

the other three English demonologists considered in this article and does not appear in the majority of accounts of

English witchcraft. Continental demonologies do, however, feature this type of act, most notable in the Malleus

Maleficarum. This suggests Scot‟s acquaintance with and perhaps reliance on a wide variety of sources.

53 Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 9; Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 2; Scot also refuted acts of what Perkins termed

juggling as means of challenging the veracity of the stereotypes attributed to witches. Regarding one example of

juggling, Scot asserted that “if they [witches] could transfer corne … from their neighbors field into their owne,

none of them would be poore, none other should be rich.” Since all of those accused as witches were not wealthy,

they clearly could not accomplish this feat. This argument exemplifies Scot‟s reliance on common sense and logic,

usually identified as skepticism, to make his case against witchcraft. Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 176.


39

such conference between a spirituall divell and a corporall witch.”55

Scot argued that a human

being cannot converse with the Devil, who exists only as a spirit without physical form. He

asserted “that the joining of hands with the divell, [and] the kissing of his bare buttocks … are

absurd lies” since according to the Scriptures, “a spirit hath no flesh, bones, nor sinews, whereof

hands, buttocks … and lips doo consist.”56

Since the Devil could not physically interact with a

human, a meeting between a witch and a Devil could not have actually taken place.

According to Scot, interrogators investigating charges of witchcraft had themselves

created the idea of a pact between the witch and the Devil. Scot cautioned that witches‟

confessions were untrustworthy and that the accounts of the pact with the Devil owed their

existence to the persistent examinations and coercion of interrogators. Accused witches‟

confessions could not be trusted because “their confessions are extorted” either through the use

of torture or leading questions from the interrogator, “or else proceed from an unsound mind”

when the confessed witch suffered from melancholy.57

Despite their lack of credibility, these

confessions were believed because “if the league be untrue…the witchmongers [sic] arguments

fall to the ground.”58

For Scot, this situation reinforced his broader claim that witchcraft was not

real.

Scot also attacked theologians‟ reliance on Scriptural evidence for the Devil‟s pact. He

posed an effective rhetorical question: “How chanceth it that we heare not of this bargaine in the

55

Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 397; Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 407.


57 Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 46. Scot‟s reference to torture likely stems from his response to continental

demonologists and prosecutorial practices. In England, torture was not applied at the assize courts where most

witchcraft indictments were held. Sharpe, Witchcraft, 24; Sharpe, Instruments of Darkness, 214. As Malcolm

Gaskill comments, “In England plaintiffs had to gather their own evidence to persuade a jury; torture was

irrelevant.” In Malcolm Gaskill, “Witchcraft and Evidence in Early Modern England,” Past and Present, no. 198

(February 2008): 51.


40

scriptures?”59

Scot noted that other demonologists frequently cited the Temptations of Christ

where the Devil transported Christ (Matthew 4:8 and Luke 3:9) as proof of the Devil‟s power, to

which Scot rejoined, “I hope they will not saie, that Christ had made anie ointments, or entred

into anie league with the divell.”60

The focus of “the witchmongers” on the pact with the Devil

allowed them to assert that the Devil‟s temptations were powerful, thereby emphasizing the need

for godly men (such as Perkins, Gifford, and Roberts) to combat that power.61

In contrast to Scot, William Perkins asserted that witches could and did utilize

supernatural power to produce magical effects. Perkins identified three types of maleficia:

juggling (creating transformations or illusions), divining (divulging events in the past, present, or

future), and enchanting (using spells to commit magical acts).62

Perkins argued that witches

actually engaged in these acts through diabolical power. Through enchantments witches conjured

storms, destroyed crops and livestock, caused and cured mysterious illnesses in people or

animals, and performed exorcisms.63

Perkins displayed his anti-Catholicism by categorizing

“popish remedies,” like exorcisms, as witchcraft.64

This attack on Catholicism demonstrates that

the discourse on witchcraft was part of the larger debate over correct theology in early modern

59

Scot, Discoverie of Witchcraft, 37.


61 Scott McGinnis notes that cunning folk constituted competition for pastors in the counseling of afflicted people.

Likely this motivated theologians to emphasize the godly means of resisting the Devil. See Scott McGinnis,

“„Subtiltie‟ Exposed: Pastoral Perspectives on Witch Belief in the Thought of George Gifford,” The Sixteenth

Century Journal 33, no. 3 (Autumn 2002): 673; See also Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic

(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971), 263-67.

62 Perkins, Discourse of the Damned Art, under “Page 36;” Perkins, Discourse of the Damned Art, under “;”

Perkins, Discourse of the Damned Art, under “Page32.”

63 Perkins, Discourse of the Damned Art, under "Page 31."

64 The use of charges of witchcraft as a means of attacking confessional enemies during the Age of Reformation is

discussed by Peter Elmer “„Saints or Sorcerers‟: Quakerism, Demonology and the Decline of Witchcraft in

Seventeenth-Century England,” in Witchcraft in Early Modern Europe: Studies in Culture and Belief, ed. Jonathan

Barry, Marianne Hester, and Gareth Roberts (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 145-80.

41

England.65

Like many English divines, Perkins advocated for his particular type of reform.

Perkins responded to Scot‟s assertion that only God‟s power performed supernatural acts

by emphasizing instead a pact between the Devil and the witch. According to him, this pact

formalized the collusion between the witch and the Devil and granted the witch access to

supernatural power.66

Perkins noted that “it is the practise of the devil to offer to make bargains

... with man” to provide “the Ground of all the practises of Witchcraft ... a league or covenant

made between the Witch and the Devil: wherein they doe mutually bind themselves each to

other.”67

People entered into this agreement because the Devil offered to alleviate their

misfortunes since “the nature of man is exceeding impatient in … afflictions … that some …

care not what means they use … to ease and helpe themselves.68

According to Perkins, the Devil created these evil covenants out of anger. Satan sought to

“draw them [witches] from the covenant of God, and disgrace the same.”69

The Devil‟s pact

inverted God‟s covenant with His people. Perkins elaborates on this inverted covenant: “as God

hath made a Covenant with his Church …. requiring of them … faith and obedience; so doth

Satan indent with his Subjects by mutuall confederacies … whereby they bind themselves … to

65

Elmer notes, “Educated belief in witchcraft and the detailed theories of the demonologists ... was firmly rooted in

the early modern preoccupation with order, authority and uniformity. In England, prior to the civil war, support for

the godly commonwealth was thus reinforced by the recognition of its opposite, demonic disorder, which for true

patriots took the form of devil-worshipping witches, aided and abetted by Catholic fifth columnists.” Elmer, “„Saints

or Sorcerers,‟” 162-63; He also documents the appropriation of the label witchcraft for use against one‟s enemies:

“During the civil war itself, both sides habitually resorted to the language of witchcraft, most obviously as a form of

crude propaganda, but equally as a valuable authorising agent in the struggle to establish the righteousness of one‟s

particular cause.” See “„Saints or Sorcerers,‟” 164.

66 Perkins‟s influence on this point is highlighted by Gaskill: “In the seventeenth century, partly due to Perkins‟s

ideas, the diabolical pact became the salient characteristic of the witch‟s crime.” In Gaskill, “”Witchcraft and

Evidence,” 45.




42

observe his Rules, and he … to accomplish their desires.”70

Thus, Perkins attributed a double

purpose to that inverted covenant: disgracing both people and God. He worried that denying the

existence of witchcraft would increase the probability the people would be drawn into this

disgrace through a pact with the Devil.

Perkins identified two types of pact with the Devil. He termed the first type of pact an

open covenant. This open covenant differed from the closed, or secret, pact since it sometimes

occurred in the presence of other witches. Perkins divulged his source of knowledge about these

agreements: the confessions of accused witches. These witches “have confessed with one

consent, that the very ground-work of all their practises in this wicked art, is their league with the

devil.”71

Therefore, Perkins knew that witches entered into a pact with the Devil because they

openly declared so. In contrast to Scot, then, Perkins accepted the validity of these confessions so

long as the accused which had freely confessed following the establishment of strong suspicions

against him or her.

When considering the existence and source of harmful magic, George Gifford again

balanced the ideas espoused in the texts of Perkins and Scot. Like Perkins and Roberts, he

asserted that magical acts could occur, but, unlike them, he maintained that they were not caused

by the witch. Like Scot, Gifford denied the ability of a human witch to commit magical acts.

However, in contrast to Scot, he explained that the acts themselves were real; the Devil, rather

than the witch, was the source of these acts. Like Scot, Gifford worried that people would

incorrectly attribute supernatural power directly to a human witch. However, in contrast to Scot,

Gifford also worried that people would fail to take magical acts seriously, leaving them easy

70

Perkins, Discourse of the Damned Art, under "Page 2."


43

targets for the Devil‟s temptations.

Gifford asserted, as Perkins did, that witches derived power from the Devil, although

Gifford did not describe a physical ceremony through which this bargain was formalized. He

noted that “it is so evident by the Scriptures, and in all experience, that there be witches which

worke by the devil, or rather I may say, that devil worketh by them, that such as go about to

prove the contrarie, doe shewe themselves but cavillers.”72

Thus Gifford emphasized that the

Devil was the master and the witch was his servant, though many common people believed the

opposite to be true. He argued that the Devil inflamed a witch‟s malice against others, and so the

witch appeared to commit magical acts.73

Gifford diverged from Scot in asserting that the Devil

could appear to people in a physical form. The Devil or his agents must disguise themselves in

order to be able to commune with humans “to cover and hide their mightinessse” in order “to

inflames [sic] them unto wrath, malice, envy, and cruell murthers … [and] to entice them unto

wantonnessse, and whordomes, and all uncleannesse.”74

This guise allowed the Devil to

communicate with people and ensnare witches into his service. Gifford worried that people‟s

misconceptions about the nature of witchcraft led them away from God. In contrast to Perkins,

Gifford did not directly acknowledge the pacts described in witches‟ confessions, but like

Perkins, did grant that witches‟ confessions could be credible evidence.

On the issue of witches' powers, the ideas of Alexander Roberts once again most closely

conformed to those of Perkins. He maintained that “they [witches] are permissiuely abled

through the helpe of the Diuell their maister, to hurt Men and Beasts, and trouble the

72

Gifford, Dialogue, B4 v.

73 Gifford, Dialogue, D3 r. This position seems to give credence to Deborah Willis‟s idea in Malevolent Nuture

concerning an elite reconfiguration of the relationship between witch and Devil.

74 Gifford, Dialogue, C2 r.

44

elements.”75

Roberts described how witches could alter people‟s mental states: “In minde,

stirring vp men to lust, to hatred, to loue, and the like passions, and that by altering the inward

and outward sences.”76

Roberts provided specific examples of one accused witch‟s magical acts

in his treatise as he described the acts of witchcraft attributed to Mary Smith. Smith allegedly

cursed John Orkton after he hit her son. After this physical attack, she allegedly “came foorth

into the streete, cursing … him [Orkton] … and wished in a most earnest and bitter manner, that

his fingers might rotte off; wherevpon presently … his fingers did corrupt, and were cut off; as

also his toes putrified and consumed in a very strange … manner.”77

Roberts also reported that

Mary Smith caused Elizabeth Hancock to have a “torturing fit” which “so grieuously racked and

tormented through all parts of her body, as if the very flesh had beene torne from the bones”78

Roberts‟s focus on the harm that a witch could cause, with the assistance of the Devil, supported

his argument that people needed to take witchcraft seriously to avoid all of its perils. These perils

included becoming the victim of a witch‟s malice as well as becoming ensnared by the Devil‟s

treachery.

Similarly to both Perkins and Gifford, Roberts also emphasized the importance of the

Devil to witchcraft. He declared, “Whatsoeuer the Witch doth, it receiueth his force from that

society which she hath with the Diuell … and so they worke together as associates.”79

A human

witch did not possess the power to engage in magical acts. If the witch possessed such power,

God‟s authority and power would have been challenged. Like Perkins, Roberts identified two

75

Roberts, Treatise of Witchcraft, under “-24.”





45

types of pact: secret and manifest. This secret pact was a tacit agreement for the Devil to lend his

power to the witch, an interpretation reminiscent of Gifford‟s treatment of the bargain. The

manifest pact resembled Perkins‟s open pact, “wherein consent is giuen …whereby they

renounce God, and deuote themselues slaues ... vnto the Diuell, hee promising, that … they shall

doe wonders.”80

Roberts asserted that information about witchcraft could be revealed through

witches‟ “owne voluntary confessions” and accepted the validity of the confession made by

Mary Smith that confirmed the acts of witchcraft of which she had been accused and for which

she was executed.81

Unlike Scot, Perkins, or Gifford, however, Roberts underscored the

treachery of the Devil. He asserted that the Devil could not be counted upon to uphold his end of

the bargain. Roberts admonished, “But herein these seduced wretches are deceiued: for these

promises which he makes, are treacherous.”82

Thus people must be on their guard against the

Devil‟s deceptions.

Perkins, Gifford, and Roberts all argued that the Devil provided the source of a witch‟s

ability to access supernatural power. The witch gained this ability through the formation of a pact

with the Devil whereby the witch pledged allegiance to the Devil, thus renouncing God and

following the Devil into the sin of disobedience. The three theologians urged people to take

witchcraft seriously and be on guard against the Devil‟s temptations despite disagreeing on the

exact nature of the allocation of power among God, the Devil and humans. In contrast, Reginald

Scot asserted that purported witches could not commit magical acts because they could not in

fact access supernatural power. Further, he stressed the impossibility of a pact between a witch

and the Devil on the grounds that a spiritual being, such as the Devil, could not consort with a

80

Roberts, Treatise of Witchcraft, under “Page 34.”



46

physical human being. He feared that belief in witchcraft led people astray from God by

attributing divine power to a human witch.

Conclusion

Each of these English demonologists responded to a climate of fear surrounding as well

as contributing to early modern witchcraft beliefs. However, their responses reflected different

concerns, as did their interpretations of the fears that drove contemporary ideas about witchcraft

as well as the importance of combating it, indicating a lack of uniformity in the beliefs of the

demonologists themselves. As Protestant theologians, William Perkins, George Gifford, and

Alexander Roberts exhibited similar interpretations about the nature of the relationship among

God, the Devil, and humans. Humans could yield to the Devil‟s temptations and commit magical

acts only to the extent that God granted permission to do so. These theologians worried that

people would misinterpret this relationship, thus challenging God's power, and the lack of

official Church of England doctrine regarding witchcraft exacerbated this fear. At the same time,

they espoused the notion that a denial of the existence of witchcraft would leave people

vulnerable to the power of the Devil. In contrast, Reginald Scot attempted to counteract the

effects of the fear of witchcraft advocated by the theologians. Rather, he emphasized that the

consequences of this climate of fear perpetrated by such men were more frightening than the

prospect of witches causing harm. The theologians encouraged early moderns to be suspicious of

their neighbors and potentially to accuse them of witchcraft. The consequences of belief in

witchcraft and its resulting tensions included imbuing a witch with God‟s power and denying

God‟s ability to inflict trials and punishments upon His followers.

These authors thus demonstrated a lack of consensus on the main issues considered in

this article, especially the formation and operation of the pact with the Devil, an issue which is

47

frequently emphasized as a uniquely “elite” concern by modern scholars.83

Each of the four early

modern authors addressed the establishment of religious authority and theological debates during

the long English Reformation through a discussion of witchcraft, its dangers, and its associated

theological implications. A study of their works reveals the negotiation of witchcraft beliefs

among the educated elites in England, partially in response to the absence of a formal statement

of proper belief concerning witchcraft from the Church of England.

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