Note 27 — Front matter

How powerful this argument was to the men of that time may be inferred from the words of the eminent Italian theological professor Isolani, who in 1506 published an argument (“Libellus adversus magos,” etc.) to prove that men cannot be bewitched into taking religious vows, and who, though a Dominican, was not an inquisitor, and was by no means prone to superstition. “Querant qui haec vana fictaque judicaverint processus totis Cristiani imperii finibus apprime notos, quos virieruditissimi, omnium virtutum genere preclarissimi, reis narrantibus composuere. His minime assentiant, qui Demonas ... esse nequaquam opinantur.” There are not wanting still good people who marvel at what they call the “agreement” in the testimony of the witches. To such may be commended the prescribed lists of interrogatories, which from more than one “Instruction to Judges” are now making their way to light. And, even where these were not used, leading questions were the rule, and the victim had little more to do than answer yes or no. Only here and there in the trials do we find some poor quivering woman begging her judges to tell her what she must confess. The confession was a criterion, not of the guilt of the witch, but of the learning of her inquisitors. It is rather a marvel that there should ever be disagreement, when the victim not only had such prompters, but must herself time and again have heard just such confessions read, as the custom was, to the crowd gathered about the stake. And if any are puzzled that the confessions should be persisted in after the torture and in the face of death (which, in countless cases, they were not), they should remember that persistence in confession was long a condition of that “forbearance of the Court” which suffered the prisoner to be first strangled or beheaded, instead of being burned alive. Only the Church always burned alive.