While only Venice in the whole of Europe defied the church upon this point, emphatically protesting against such robbery of her citizens, she ultimately succeeded in establishing a treaty with the pope whereby the inheritance of the condemned was retained in the family. The rebellion of Venice against the church upon the question of property belonging to its subjects, a question upon which the state held itself pre-eminent, soon effected a radical change and had remarkable effect in lessening the number of accusations in that state.[53] Theft by the church in that direction, no longer possible, accusations of witchcraft soon ceased; being no longer recognized as sin, after ceasing to bring money into the coffers of the church.
It is a fact noted by very many authorities that when witchcraft fell under control of the state, its penalties were greatly lessened while accusations grew fewer. Yet for a period, even the civil power aided in spreading this belief, offering rewards for conviction; and as the church had grown immensely rich by means of witch persecution, so the state increased its own power and wealth through similar means. The theory of Bishop Butler that whole communities at times become mad, seems proven by the experience of this period. Upon no other ground but that of universal insanity can excusable explanation be offered. But for the church no such exculpation is possible, her teachings and her acts having created this wholesale madness of communities. Experience of her course during preceding centuries shows us that the persecution of the witchcraft period was but a continuation of her policy from the moment of her existence—that of universal dominion over the lives, the property, and the thoughts of mankind. Neither rank, nor learning, age, nor goodness freed a woman from accusation.[54] The mother of the great astronomer, Kepler, a woman of noble family, died in chains having been accused of witchcraft.[55] The council of Bourges tortured a reputed witch who was only known for her good works. A determined effort for the destruction of every virtue among women seemed made at this period. In the middle of the XIII century, the Emperor Theodore Lascarius caused a noble lady of his court to be entirely stripped of her clothing, and placed thus nude in a sack with cats, but even this torture failed to extort a confession from her innocent lips. Even in America, women of the purest lives, all of whose years had been given to good works, met with death from like accusation.
Soon after the confirmation of celibacy as a dogma of the church, at the time when the persecution for witchcraft so rapidly increased, which was also the period of the greatest oppression under feudalism—a peculiar and silent rebellion against both church and state took place among the peasantry of Europe, who assembled in the seclusion of night and the forest, their only place of safety in which to speak of their wrongs. Freedom for the peasant was found only at night. Known as “Birds of the Night,” “Foxes,” “Birds of Prey,” it was only at night assemblages that they enjoyed the least happiness or freedom. Here with wives and daughters, they met to talk over the gross outrages perpetrated upon them. Out of their foul wrongs grew the sacrifice of the “Black Mass” with women as officiating priestess, in which the rites of the church were travestied in solemn mockery, and defiance cast at that heaven which permitted the priest and the lord alike to trample upon all the sacred rights of womanhood, in the name of religion and law. During this mocking service a true sacrifice of wheat was offered to the “Spirit of the Earth” who made wheat to grow, and loosened birds bore aloft to the “God of Freedom” the sighs and prayers of the serfs asking that their descendants might be free. We can but regard this sacrifice as the most acceptable offering made in that day of moral degradation; a sacrifice and a prayer more holy than all the ceremonials of the church. This service where woman by virtue of her greater despair acted both as altar and priest, opened with the following address and prayer. “I will come before Thine altar, but save me, O, Lord, from the faithless and violent man!” (from the priest and the baron).[56] From these assemblages known as “Sabbat” or “the Sabbath” from the old Pagan mid-summer-day sacrifice to “Bacchus Sabiesa” rose the belief in the “Witches Sabbath,” which for several hundred years formed a source of accusation against women, sending tens of thousands to most horrible deaths. The thirteenth century was about the central period of this rebellion of the serfs against God and the church when they drank each other’s blood as a sacrament, while secretly speaking of their oppression.[57] The officiating priestess was usually about thirty years old, having experienced all the wrongs that woman suffered under church and state. She was entitled “The Elder” yet in defiance of that God to whom the serfs under church teaching ascribed all their wrongs, she was also called “The Devil’s bride.” This period was especially that of woman’s rebellion against the existing order of religion and government in both church and state. While man was connected with her in these ceremonies as father, husband, brother, yet all accounts show that to woman as the most deeply wronged, was accorded all authority. Without her, no man was admitted to this celebration, which took place in the seclusion of the forest and under the utmost secrecy. Offerings were made to the latest dead and the most newly born of the district, and defiance hurled against that God to whose injustice the church had taught woman that all her wrongs were due.
Women’s knowledge of herbs was made use of in a preparation of Solanae which mixed with mead, beer, cider, or farcy—the strong drink of the west—disposed the oppressed serfs to joyous dancing and partial forgetfulness of their wrongs during these popular night gatherings of the Sabbath.[58] It became “the comforter” throwing the friendly mantle of partial oblivion over the mental suffering of “him who had been so wronged” as it had done for the mother’s physical pain. “The Sabbath” was evidently the secret protest of men and women whom church and state in combination had utterly oppressed and degraded. For centuries there seemed no hope for this class of humanity—for this degraded portion of christendom—yet, even then women held position of superiority in these night assemblages. Among the “Papers of the Bastile,” a more extended account of woman officiating as her own altar, is to be found.[59]
The injustice of man towards woman under the laws of both Church and State engrafted upon society, have resulted in many evils unsuspected by the world, which if known would strike it with amazement and terror. Even Louis Lingg, one of the condemned Chicago anarchists, young, handsome, of vigorous intellect, who uncomplainingly accepted for himself that death he had decreed to the representatives to law; even he, who neither asked mercy nor accepted the death decreed him, was the outgrowth of woman’s wrongs. His mother with whom his fate was thrown, a woman of the people in Hungary, belonging to a powerless class crushed for centuries, the plaything of those above them;—his father, a representative of the aristocracy descended from a long line of military ancestors, leaving him, as the church had taught him, to the sole care of the mother he had betrayed, it was impossible for this boy not to find in his breast a turmoil of conflicting emotions, but above all, ruling all, a hatred of entrenched oppression; nor did his father’s military blood fail to play its part, leading to the final result which affrighted a city and closed his young life.
In looking at the history of witchcraft we see three striking points for consideration:
First: That women were chiefly accused.
Second: That men believing in woman’s inherent wickedness, and understanding neither the mental nor the physical peculiarities of her being, ascribed all her idiosyncrasies to witchcraft.
Third: That the clergy inculcated the idea that woman was in league with the devil, and that strong intellect, remarkable beauty, or unusual sickness were in themselves proof of this league.
Catholics and protestants yet agree in holding women as the chief accessory of the devil.[60]