Page:A Collection of Several Philosophical Writings of Dr. Henry More.djvu/150

108 ''was thrown down and put out: at which time there being a little Boy that was almost asleep, but with this noise affrighted, he had no power with the rest to goe out of the room, but stayed there, and saw a Spirit in the likeness of a great black man with no head in the room, scuffling with the Maid, who took her and set her into a Chair, and told her that she must goe with him, he was come for her Soul, she had given it to him. But the Maid answered, that her Soul was none of her own to give; and he had already got her blood, but as for her Soul he should never have it: and after a while tumbling and throwing about of the Maid, he vanished away.''

And that that which the Boy heard and saw was no fancy of his own, but a reall object of his Senses, the Witches condition in another Chamber at the same time does not obscurely argue. For she was then seen with her clothes off, in her fetters, running about like mad; and being asked why she ran about the room, she replied, She could not keep her bed, but was pulled out by violence, and being asked the reason why, she replied, Pray you what is the matter in your Chamber? Nothing, said they, but a Childe is not well. To which she answered. Do not you lie to me, for I know what is the matter as well as your selves.

10. But to return to the Maid, from whom we may draw further Arguments relating also to the Witch. As that, when the Maid had not for many dayes and nights together taken any rest, and being then under most grievous hurryings and tortures of the body, the Witch being brought into the room where she lay, the design unknown to her, and the time of her entring, yet so soon as the Witch had set one foot into the room, she gave a most hideous glance with her eyes, and shut them presently after, falling asleep in a moment, and slept about three hours so fast, that when they would have wakened her they could not by any art or violence whatever, as by stopping her breath, putting things up her nostrils, holding her upright, striking of her, and the like. The Witch also declared her unwillingness that she should be wakened, crying out, O pray you by no means awake the Maid, for if she should awake I should be torn in pieces, and the Devil would fetch me away bodily. And a further evidence that this sleep of the Maid did some way depend upon the Witch is, that so soon as the Witch had gone from under the roof where she was, the Maid wakened of her self; and so soon as the Maid awakened, and was at ease (the Devil, as she said, having gone out of her stomach, but doing her no violence, onely making her body tremble a little,) the Witch began to roar and cry out, The Devil will tear me in pieces. These things you may read more fully and particularly in the Narration of Edmond Bower, who was an eye-witness of them. But what I have trsnscribed from thence I think is sufficient to convince any indifferent man, that what befell the Maid after her revealing those secrets she was intrusted with, was not counterfeited, but reall, nay, I may safely say, Supernatural.

11. Fourthly and lastly, her behaviour at the Assizes, when she gave evidence against the Witch, was so earnest and serious, with that strength of mind and free and confident appeals to the Witch her self, that, as I was informed of those that were Spectators of that