Page:The history of Witchcraft and demonology.djvu/154

 ''to ashes. All present take a small part of these ashes, which the Sorcerers use for their charms.''

As the procedure in the various Sabbats differed very greatly according to century, decade, country, district, nay, even in view of the station of life and, it would seem, the very temperaments of the assembly, it is only possible to outline in a general way some of the most remarkable ceremonies which took place on the occasions of these infernal congregations. An intimate and intensive study of the Sabbat would require a large volume, for it is quite possible to reconstruct the rites in every particular, although the precise order of the ritual was not always and everywhere the same.

Dom Calmet, it is true, has very mistakenly said: “To attempt to give a description of the Sabbat, is to attempt a description of what does not exist, & what has never existed save in the fantastic & disordered imagination of warlocks & witches: the pictures which have been drawn of these assemblies are merely the phantasy of those who dreamed that they had actually been borne, body & soul, through the air to the Sabbat.” Happy sceptic! But unfortunately the Sabbat did—and does—take place; formerly in deserted wastes, on the hill-side, in secluded spots, now, as often as not, in the privacy of vaults and cellars, and in those lone empty houses innocently placarded “To be Sold.”

The President of the Sabbat was in purely local gatherings often the Officer of the district; in the more solemn assemblies convened from a wider area, the Grand Master, whose dignity would be proportionate to the numbers of the company and the extent of his province. In any case the President was officially known as the “Devil,” and it would seem that his immediate attendants and satellites were also somewhat loosely termed “devils,” which formal nomenclature has given rise to considerable confusion and not a little mystification in the reports of witch trials and the confessions of offenders. But in many instances it is certain—and orthodoxy forbids us to doubt the possibility—that the Principle of Evil, incarnate, was present for the hideous adoration his besotted worshippers. Such is the sense of the Fathers,