[41] Jo. Bodin. Method. historic. Amstelod. 1650. 12mo, Ch. V. p. 99.—Idem, de Republica. Francofurt. 1591. 8vo. Lib. V. Ch. I. p. 789.
A very remarkable case, illustrative in part of this observation, where, however, not the person who was supposed to be the subject of the demoniacal malady, but its alleged authors, were punished, is thus reported by Dr. Watt of Glasgow:—“It occurred at Bargarran, in Renfrewshire, in 1696. The patient’s name was Christian Shaw, a girl of eleven years of age. She is described as having had violent fits of leaping, dancing, running, crying, fainting, &c., but the whole narrative is mixed up with so much credulity and superstition, that it is impossible to separate truth from fiction. These strange fits continued from August, 1696, till the end of March in the year following, when the patient recovered.” An account of the whole was published at Edinburgh, in 1698, entitled, “A true Narrative of the Sufferings of a Young Girl, who was strangely molested by evil spirits, and their instruments, in the West, collected from authentic testimonies.”
The whole being ascribed to witchcraft, the clergy were most active on the occasion. Besides occasional days of humiliation, two solemn fasts were observed throughout the whole bounds of the Presbytery, and a number of clergymen and elders were appointed in rotation, to be constantly on the spot. So far the matter was well enough. But such was the superstition of the age, that a memorial was presented to his Majesty’s most honourable Privy Council, and on the 19th of January, 1697, a warrant was issued, setting forth “that there were pregnant grounds of suspicion of witchcraft in Renfrewshire, especially from the afflicted and extraordinary condition of Christian Shaw, daughter of John Shaw, of Bargarran.” A commission was therefore granted to Alexander Lord Blantyre, Sir John Maxwell, Sir John Shaw, and five others, together with the sheriff of the county, to inquire into the matter, and report. This commission is signed by eleven privy councillors, consisting of some of the first noblemen and gentlemen in the kingdom.
The report of the commissioners having fully confirmed the suspicions respecting the existence of witchcraft, another warrant was issued on the 5th of April, 1697, to Lord Hallcraig, Sir John Houston, and four others, “to try the persons accused of witchcraft, and to sentence the guilty to be burned, or otherwise executed to death, as the commission should incline.”
The commissioners, thus empowered, were not remiss in the discharge of their duty. After twenty hours were spent in the examination of witnesses, and counsel heard on both sides, the counsel for the prosecution “exhorted the jury to beware of condemning the innocent; but at the same time, should they acquit the prisoners in opposition to legal evidence, they would be accessory to all the blasphemies, apostacies, murders, tortures, and seductions, whereof these enemies of heaven and earth should hereafter be guilty.” After the jury had spent six hours in deliberation, seven of the miserable wretches, three men and four women, were condemned to the flames, and the sentence faithfully executed at Paisley, on the 10th of June, 1697.—Medico-Chirurg. Trans. Vol. V. p. 20, et seq.—Transl. note.
[43] Compare Olaus Magnus, de gentibus septentrionalibus. Lib. XVIII. Ch. 45–47. p. 642, seq. Rom. 1555. fol.
Burton, in his Anatomy of Melancholy, has the following observations, which, with the ample references by which they are accompanied, will furnish materials for such a history.
“Lycanthropia, which Avicenna calls cucubuth, others lupinam insaniam, or wolf-madness, when men run howling about graves and fields in the night, and will not be persuaded but that they are wolves, or some such beasts. Aëtius (Lib. 6. cap. 11.) and Paulus (Lib. 3. cap. 16.) call it a kind of melancholy; but I should rather refer it to madness, as most do. Some make a doubt of it, whether there be any such disease. Donat. ab Altomari (Cap. 9. Art. Med.) saith, that he saw two of them in his time: Wierus (De Præstig. Demonum, 1. 3. cap. 21.) tells a story of such a one at Padua, 1541, that would not believe to the contrary, but that he was a wolf. He hath another instance of a Spaniard, who thought himself a bear. Forestus (Observat. lib. 10. de Morbis Cerebri, c. 15.) confirms as much by many examples; one, among the rest, of which he was an eye-witness, at Alcmaer in Holland.—A poor husbandman that still hunted about graves, and kept in churchyards, of a pale, black, ugly, and fearful look. Such, belike, or little better, were king Prœtus’ daughters, (Hippocrates lib. de insaniâ,) that thought themselves kine: and Nebuchadnezzar, in Daniel, as some interpreters hold, was only troubled with this kind of madness. This disease, perhaps, gave occasion to that bold assertion of Pliny, (Lib. 8. cap. 22. homines interdum lupos fieri; et contra,) some men were turned into wolves in his time, and from wolves to men again; and to that fable of Pausanias, of a man that was ten years a wolf, and afterwards turned to his former shape; to Ovid’s (Met. lib. 1.) tale of Lycaon, &c. He that is desirous to hear of this disease, or more examples, let him read Austin in his eighteenth book, de Civitate Dei, cap. 5; Mizaldus, cent. 5. 77; Schenkius, lib. 1. Hildesheim, Spicil. 2. de maniâ; Forestus, lib. 10. de morbis cerebri; Olaus Magnus; Vicentius Bellavicensis, spec. met. lib. 31. c. 122; Pierius, Bodine, Zuinger, Zeilgur, Peucer, Wierus, Spranger, &c. This malady, saith Avicenna, troubleth men most in February, and is now-a-days frequent in Bohemia and Hungary, according to Heurnius. (Cap. de Man.) Schernitzius will have it common in Livonia. They lie hid, most part, all day, and go abroad in the night, barking, howling, at graves and deserts; they have usually hollow eyes, scabbed legs and thighs, very dry and pale, (Ulcerata crura; sitis ipsis adest immodica; pallidi; lingua sicca,) saith Altomarus: he gives a reason there of all the symptoms, and sets down a brief cure of them.”—Burton’s Anatomy of Melancholy. Tenth Edit.: 8vo. 1804. Vol. 1. Page 13, et seq.