CENTUEY X. 121 



fore, as divers wise judges have prescribed ami cau 

 tioned, men may not too rashly believe the confessions 

 of witches, nor yet the evidence against them. For the 

 witches themselves are imaginative, and believe oft- 

 times they do that which they do not : and people are 

 credulous in that point, and ready to impute accidents 

 and natural operations to witchcraft. It is worthy the 

 observing, that both in ancient and late times (as in 

 the Thessalian witches, and the meetings o f witches 

 that have been recorded by so many late confessions) 

 the great wonders which they tell, of carrying in the 

 air, transforming themselves into other bodies, &c., are 

 still reported to be wrought, not by incantations or 

 ceremonies, but by ointments, and anointing themselves 

 all over. This may justly move a man to think that 

 these fables are the effects of imagination : for it is cer 

 tain that ointments do all (if they be laid on any thino- 

 thick) by stopping of the pores, shut in the vapours, 

 and send them to the head extremely. And for the 

 particular ingredients of those magical ointments, it is 

 like they are opiate and soporiferous. For anointing 

 of the forehead, neck, feet, back-bone, we know is used 

 for procuring dead sleeps : and if any man say that this 

 effect would be better done by inward potions ; answer 

 may be made, that the medicines which go to the oint 

 ments are so strong, that if they were used inwards 

 they would kill those that use them : and therefore 

 they work potently, though outwards. 



We will divide the several kinds of the opera 

 tions by transmission of spirits and imagination; 

 which will give no small light to the experiments 

 that follow. All operations by transmission of 



