Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/525

 POWERLESS AGAINST JUSTICE. 509 Satan, and that it would never be free from their malignant ven- geance until they should all be exterminated. For more than two centuries this craze was perpetually breaking out in one part of Europe after another, carefully nursed and stimulated by popes and inquisitors like Innocent VIII. and Leo X., Sprenger and In- stitoris, Bernard of Como and Bishop Binsfeld, and the amount of human misery thence arising is simply incomputable. Fortunately on one side there was a limitation upon the other- wise illimitable powers of the witch. The contrast was so absurd between the faculties attributed to her and her utter inability to protect herself against those who tortured and burned her with impunity, that some explanation of the inconsistency was requi- site. The demonologists therefore invented the comforting theo- ry that through the goodness of God the witch instantaneously lost her power as soon as the hand of an officer of justice was laid upon her. But for this, indeed, it might have been difficult to find men hardy enough to seize, imprison, try, and execute these delegates of Satan, whose slightest ill-will was so dangerous. Judges and their officials thus were encouraged to perform their functions and were told that they need dread no reprisals. It was true that, like all theories framed to meet artificial condi- tions, this one was not always reconcilable to the facts. The strange fortitude with which the culprits occasionally endured the severest and most prolonged tortures, so far from being a proof of innocence, was regarded as showing that even in the hands of justice the devil was sometimes able to protect his servants by en- dowing them with what was called the gift of taciturnity, and the ingenuity of the inquisitors was taxed to the utmost to overcome his wiles. When this was once admitted it was difficult to deny that he could assist them in other ways, and it was recommended to the officers charged with the arrest that when they seized a witch they should on no account allow her to enter her chamber, lest she should secure some charm that would enable her to en- dure the torture. Such charms might be secreted about her per- son, or under the skin, or even in accessible cavities of the body, so the first thing to be done was to shave the prisoner from head to foot and subject her to the most indecent examination. It was on record that in Katisbon some heretics condemned to be burned remained unhurt in the flames ; vainly were they submerged in