"Witchcraft" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... decorous; but can we imagine Virgil praying, or anybody praying, to the gods of the Aeneid? The supernatural machinery of Camoens and Tasso is frankly absurd; they are not only careless of credibility, but of sanity. Lucan tried to do without gods; but his witchcraft engages belief even more faintly than the mingled Paganism and Christianity of Camoens, and merely shows how strongly the most rationalistic of epic poets felt the value of some imaginary relaxation in the limits of human existence. Is it, then, only as such a relaxation that ...
— The Epic - An Essay • Lascelles Abercrombie
... that our friend Sampson, although a profound scholar and mathematician, had not travelled so far in philosophy as to doubt the reality of witchcraft or apparitions. Born indeed at a time when a doubt in the existence of witches was interpreted as equivalent to a justification of their infernal practices, a belief of such legends had been impressed upon the Dominie as an article indivisible from his religious ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... of Balmerino began. It was prefaced by addresses from Sir Richard Loyd, king's counsel, and from Mr. Serjeant Skinner, who made, what was justly considered by H. Walpole, "the most absurd speech imaginable," calling "Rebellion, surely the sin of witchcraft," and applying to the Duke of Cumberland the unfortunate appellation of "Scipio."[363] The Attorney General followed, and witnesses were afterwards examined, who fully proved, though accused by Balmerino of some inconsistencies, his acts of adherence to the Chevalier; his being present in towns ...
— Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745 - Volume III. • Mrs. Thomson
... "Liberty under the Law." Liberty under the law is what the government-ridden peasants of Russia enjoy. Liberty under the law was the pleasure of those who expired with indescribable agony on the rack and amid the flames. Liberty under the law was meted out to the millions of victims of the witchcraft delusion. Liberty under the law was also the liberty of our Southern chattel slaves before as well as after the war. Liberty under the law is the same old idea of liberty which every tyrant has ever advanced. As ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 4, June 1906 - Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature • Various
... magic, was concerned with the evocation of demons and devils—spirits supposed to be superior to man in certain powers, but utterly depraved. Sorcery may be distinguished from witchcraft, inasmuch as the sorcerer attempted to command evil spirits by the aid of charms, etc., whereas the witch or wizard was supposed to have made a pact with the Evil One; though both terms have been rather loosely used, "sorcery" being sometimes ...
— Bygone Beliefs • H. Stanley Redgrove
... the gods are themselves unchangeable, still by witchcraft and deception they may make us think that ...
— The Republic • Plato
... reawakening; but it was then a most loud matter; filling the European Courts, and especially that of Berlin, with rumors and apprehensions. No wonder Friedrich Wilhelm was grateful for that Swedish Peace of his, and named his little daughter "Ulrique" in honor of it. Tumultuous cloud-world of Lapland Witchcraft had ceased hereby, and daylight had begun: old women (or old Cardinals) riding through the sky, on broomsticks, to meet Satan, where now are they? The fact still dimly perceptible is, Europe, thanks to that pair of Black-Artists, Gortz ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Volume IV. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Friedrich's Apprenticeship, First Stage—1713-1728 • Thomas Carlyle
... Astrology: Sometimes in their own hopes and feares, called Thumomancy, or Presage: Sometimes in the Prediction of Witches, that pretended conference with the dead; which is called Necromancy, Conjuring, and Witchcraft; and is but juggling and confederate knavery: Sometimes in the Casuall flight, or feeding of birds; called Augury: Sometimes in the Entrayles of a sacrificed beast; which was Aruspicina: Sometimes in Dreams: Sometimes in Croaking ...
— Leviathan • Thomas Hobbes
... the good tunes. I shall merely add that the author of the Latin poetry seems to have been Richard de Ledrede, who filled {386} the see of Ossory from 1318 to 1360, and was rendered famous by his proceedings against Dame Alice Kyteller for heresy and witchcraft. (See a contemporary account of the "proceedings" published by the Camden Society in 1843; a most valuable contribution to Irish history, and well deserving of still more editorial labour than has been bestowed on it.) I have ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 54, November 9, 1850 • Various
... of the Middle Ages, are full of such things; though the reader who may wish to obtain information on this subject need not go so far back. Only eighty years since, the learned and celebrated Storch, of the school of Stahl, published a treatise on witchcraft, worthy of the fourteenth century."—Treatise on ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... finger shall be thicker than my father's loins; my father hath chastised you with whips, but I will chastise you with scorpions"; and Samuel prophesying to Saul how dearly he shall learn that "Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness as ...
— Holbein • Beatrice Fortescue
... Statutes of Apparel continue, and the statutes fixing the price of wine, which, indeed, seems to have been the last subject so regulated. There is the "Bloody Statute" against heresy, and the first act against witchcraft, Tindale's translation of the Bible is prohibited, and women and laborers forbidden to read the New Testament. There is the first act for the preservation of the river Thames, and also for the cleaning of ...
— Popular Law-making • Frederic Jesup Stimson
... his striking bells. Indeed, when one considers the superstition of the age, we cannot but grant it was almost fortunate a clock such as ours was not then invented, for people were great believers in witchcraft and were liable to attribute to evil spirits anything they did not understand, and ...
— Christopher and the Clockmakers • Sara Ware Bassett
... could never be known with certainty. Others by accident might have escaped; and this apparently miraculous escape had great weight in confirming the authority of this trial. How long did we continue in punishing innocent people for witchcraft, though experience might, to thinking persons, have frequently discovered the injustice of that proceeding! whilst to the generality a thousand equivocal appearances, confessions from fear or weakness, in fine, the torrent of popular prejudice rolled down through ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke
... after all, between the belief of the ignorant Russians, or Spaniards, or Portuguese, or other European people, and these unhappy blacks," exclaimed Harry one day when we were discussing the subject. The fearful curse of the country, however, is the belief in witchcraft. When a person is seized with illness, he always believes that some enemy has caused it, and is not satisfied until the witch or wizard is discovered, who is immediately compelled to swallow poison, or is barbarously put to death in some other way. I prefer thus giving a short ...
— The Two Supercargoes - Adventures in Savage Africa • W.H.G. Kingston
... without an inward chuckle as she recalled Mr. Hennage's warning and discovered that Mrs. Pennycook's mouth did really resemble a new buttonhole—as the mouth of every respectable, self-righteous, provincial female bigot has had a habit of resembling even as far back as the days of the Salem witchcraft. ...
— The Long Chance • Peter B. Kyne
... story[121] told by his father of a ghost or demon which he saw in his youth while he was a scholar in the house of Giovanni Resta at Pavia. He searches the pages of Hector Boethius, Nicolaus Donis, Rugerus, Petrus Toletus, Leo Africanus, and other chroniclers of the marvellous, for tales of witchcraft, prodigies, and monstrous men and beasts, and devotes a whole chapter to chiromancy,[122] a subject with which he had occupied his plenteous leisure when he was waiting for patients at Sacco. The diagram of the human hand ...
— Jerome Cardan - A Biographical Study • William George Waters
... there's witchcraft in it;" and so with threats she forced him to follow her. But when they had gone a bit further, the lad said he must turn aside a moment out of the road; and meanwhile his mother sat down on a tree-stump. But the lad ...
— East of the Sun and West of the Moon - Old Tales from the North • Peter Christen Asbjornsen
... In those days witchcraft was implicitly believed in, so, when they saw the old creature hobble towards them, they experienced feelings of alarm that had never yet affected their manly bosoms in danger or in war. Their faces paled a little, but their courage stood the test, for they sat still ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne
... witchcraft, Wherein the lewde dealing of witches and witchmongers is notablie detected, the knauerie of coniurors, the impietie of inchantors, the follie of soothsaiers, the impudent falshood of cousenors, the infidelitie of atheists, the pestilent practises of Pythonists, the ...
— Catalogue of the Books Presented by Edward Capell to the Library of Trinity College in Cambridge • W. W. Greg
... of witchcraft illustrates, in a still more impressive way, the false ideas which governed the supposed relation of men with the spiritual world. I have no doubt many physicians shared in these superstitions. Mr. Upham says they—that is, ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... woman now rose suddenly from her seat in the window-sill, the living dread of shepherds, for she travelled the country with a brilliant reputation for witchcraft, and thus she broke in upon the narrative: "I vow, young man, ye tell us the truth upset and down-thrust. I heard my douce grandmother say that on the night when Elphin Irving disappeared—disappeared I shall call it, for the bairn can but be gone for a season, to return to us in his ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends - Scotland • Anonymous
... the frenzies of the Pythian prophetess. Similarly, at the close of the sixth book, Pompey's son consults a necromancer as to the result of the war.[301] The scene is described with not a little skill and ingenuity, but it has little raison d'etre save the gratification of the taste for witchcraft which Lucan shared with his audience ...
— Post-Augustan Poetry - From Seneca to Juvenal • H.E. Butler
... are seen sitting on opposite sides of a cross road facing each other, it is to be presumed that they are up to witchcraft and contemplate mischief. What in that case must you do? Go by another road, if there is one, and if not, with a companion, should such turn up, passing the crones arm-in-arm with him; but should there be no other road ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various
... of courts of justice are admissible, it can easily be proved that powerful and malevolent magicians once existed and were a scourge to mankind. The evidence (including confession) upon which certain women were convicted of witchcraft and executed was without a flaw; it is still unimpeachable. The judges' decisions based on it were sound in logic and in law. Nothing in any existing court was ever more thoroughly proved than the charges of witchcraft and sorcery for which so many suffered death. If there were no witches, ...
— The Devil's Dictionary • Ambrose Bierce
... and that even the most despicable creatures alive may find some pleasures. Now observe this comment; who are the most despicable creatures? Certainly, old women. What pleasure can an old woman take? Only witchcraft. I think this argument as clear as any of the devout Bishop of Cloyne's metaphysics: this being decided in a full congregation of saints, only such atheists as you and Lady Fanny can deny it. I own all the facts, as many witches have done ...
— Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Her Life and Letters (1689-1762) • Lewis Melville
... Israel, which the true Samuel had uttered some years before. Read Captain Lyon's account of the scene in the cabin with the Esquimaux bladder, or conjurer; it is impossible not to be reminded of the witch of Endor. I recommend you also to look at Webster's admirable treatise on Witchcraft. ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge
... less difficulty than had the outer dial. Maitland had it open in a twinkling. Then, brazenly lifting out the inner framework, bodily, he thrust a fumbling hand into the aperture thus disclosed and pressed the spring, releasing the panel at the back. It disappeared as though by witchcraft, and the splash of light from the bull's-eye discovered a canvas bag squatting humbly in the secret compartment: a fat little canvas bag, considerably soiled from much handling, such as is used by banks for coin, a sturdy, matter-of-fact, every-day sort of canvas bag, with ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... years Serfojee was unmolested; but, in 1792, the husband of Ameer Singh's only child died without children, and this misfortune was attributed by the Rajah to witchcraft on the part of the widows of Tuljajee. He imagined that they were contriving against his own life, and included Serfojee in his hatred. By way of revenge, he caused a pile of chilis and other noxious plants to be burnt under Serfojee's windows, and thus nearly stifled him and his attendants. ...
— Pioneers and Founders - or, Recent Workers in the Mission field • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... the Inquisitor Bernard of Como taught categorically that the phenomena of witchcraft, especially the attendance at the witches' Sabbath, were not fanciful but real: "This is proved," he says, "from the fact that the Popes permitted witches to be burned at the stake; they would not have countenanced this, if these persons ...
— The Inquisition - A Critical and Historical Study of the Coercive Power of the Church • E. Vacandard
... of and superior to nature, and still endeavors, by form, ceremony, supplication, hypocrisy, to obtain its aid. His best energies have been wasted in the service of this phantom. The horrors of witchcraft were all born of an ignorant belief in the existence of a totally depraved being superior to nature, acting in perfect independence of her laws; and all religious superstition has had for its basis a belief ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll, Volume I • Robert Green Ingersoll
... Indus and back again in less time than it takes to smoke a hookah. At Gwadur, no sooner was the cable landed than the people of the surrounding country flocked down to hear and talk of the Feringhee witchcraft. Chiefs of the Beloochees, Muscatees, and Heratees, with their retainers, trod upon each other's toes in their eagerness to see it work. Gwadur has given up the idea that Mahomet taught everything that could ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 16, No. 97, November, 1865 • Various
... I'de have e'm; for tis the only way I have to Live: The Vulgar People love to be deluded; And things the most unlikely they most dote on; A strange Disease in Cattle, Hogs or Pigs, Or any Accident in Cheese or Butter; Though't be but Natural, or a Sluts fault, Must strait be Witchcraft! Oh, the Witch was here! The Ears or Tail is burn'd, the Churn is burn'd; And this to hurt the Witch, when all the while They're likest Witches that believe such Cures; Could I do all that People think I can, I'de ne're take pains ...
— The Fatal Jealousie (1673) • Henry Nevil Payne
... to conduct, it seems that it can do so only in the way that belongs to superstition—that Conscience, as I have before said, is the bogey of mankind, and that belief in its authority is like belief in witchcraft, destined to dwindle and to fade before the advance of a better or more ...
— Mind and Motion and Monism • George John Romanes
... having been appealed to on a question of fishing privileges, replied, "with an air of a man who would not give his judgment rashly, that much might be said on both sides." It is likely, however, that De Quincey may have connected it in his mind with the discussion of witchcraft at the beginning of Spectator No. 117, where Addison balances the grounds for belief and unbelief somewhat ...
— The English Mail-Coach and Joan of Arc • Thomas de Quincey
... King of Aquitaine's sister, who was more lovely than sunlight. Her imagination fired by such stories as these, Bernadette often found it difficult to get to sleep; and this was especially the case on the evenings when the books were left aside, and some person of the company related a tale of witchcraft. The girl was very superstitious, and after sundown could never be prevailed upon to pass near a tower in the vicinity, which was said to be haunted by the fiend. For that matter, all the folks of the region were superstitious, devout, and simple-minded, ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... superstitions now entertained in some parts of Somersetshire, will be interesting to the inquirers into the history of witchcraft. I was lately informed by a member of my congregation that two children living near his house were bewitched. I made inquiries into the matter, and found that witchcraft is by far less uncommon than I had imagined. I can hardly ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 191, June 25, 1853 • Various
... each tree, and at last laid down the glass. "There is nothing to be seen," said he, thoughtfully. "If the gentry we are expecting carried any thing besides scythes, we should be compelled to believe there is some witchcraft at work. But now all is uncertainty. Beware of ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag
... as sorceresses, and with great justice, as the abominable trade which they drove in philtres and decoctions certainly entitled them to that appellation, and to the pains and penalties reserved for those who practised what was termed 'witchcraft.' ...
— The Zincali - An Account of the Gypsies of Spain • George Borrow
... discovered by the crowd. This magician was dumb. But this infirmity could only increase the consideration with which they were disposed to surround him. He only made a guttural sound, low and languid, which had no signification. The more reason for being well skilled in the mysteries of witchcraft. ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... broad interior. That front, to put it mildly, though picturesque, was not attractive. It afforded an area of greasy and dirty brown cuticle and of moose skin, if possible dirtier and greasier still. The two white men could not understand themselves. Was there witchcraft about; had they been drinking too much of the Scotch whisky in the stores? They forced their way outside and looked at the window again, and discovered that they were sane. There, pressed closely against the window by the weight of the sleeping Bigbeam, still extended ...
— The Wolf's Long Howl • Stanley Waterloo
... I seldom speak but what I think, for flattery I like neither to give nor receive. Ah, yes; there are witches in the world yet. And their witchcraft consists not in magic filters, and potent herbs gathered at midnight under the full moon; far more subtle and powerful is it. Like the poisons of eastern countries, it is communicated by a touch, by a look, by the breath of a word. This is the witchcraft ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, May 1844 - Volume 23, Number 5 • Various
... evensong at the cathedral. I shall not say what I felt when the white-surpliced boy choir entered, winding down those vaulted aisles, or when I heard for the first time that intoned service, with all its 'witchcraft of harmonic sound.' I sat quite by myself in a high carved oak seat, and the hour was passed in a trance of serene delight. I do not have many opinions, it is true, but papa says I am always strong on sentiments; nevertheless, I shall not attempt ...
— A Cathedral Courtship • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... to secure for the poor vendors of Testaments. So indeed they really were. Consulting the stars had been ruled from immemorial time to be dealing with the devil; the penalty of it was the same as for witchcraft; yet here was a reverend warden of a college considering it his duty to write eagerly of a discovery obtained by these forbidden means, to his own diocesan, begging him to communicate with the Cardinal of York and the Bishop of London, ...
— History of England from the Fall of Wolsey to the Death of Elizabeth. Vol. II. • James Anthony Froude
... came back to his native land as captain-general and governor-in-chief of the colony of Massachusetts. From sheep-boy he had risen to the title of "Your Excellency." Phips was governor of Massachusetts during the witchcraft delusion. The part he took in it was not a very active one; but when, in 1693, he found that grand juries were beginning to throw out indictments, and petit juries to return verdicts of "Not guilty," he ended the whole mad business by emptying the ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... himself; and, if so unfortunate as to lose a chief, or other great personage, is sure to pay the penalty by parting with his own life. The duties of the "Medicine Man" among the Indians are so mixed up with witchcraft and jugglery, so filled with the pretence of savage quackery, so completely rude and unfounded as to principle, that it is impossible to define the practice for any useful end. About five years since, a young ...
— The Life and Adventures of Kit Carson, the Nestor of the Rocky Mountains, from Facts Narrated by Himself • De Witt C. Peters
... must speak to you first," said Lady Charlotte hurriedly, thinking that she saw Emilia's hands stretch out. "Pray, don't go into attitudes. There he is, as you perceive; and I don't use witchcraft. Come with me; I will send for him. Haven't you learnt by this time that there's nothing he detests so much as a public display of the kind ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... representing in themselves the current forms of Religion, Art, and Science. These three Snt George successively challenges, tackles, and flattens out—the first as lunacy, the second as harlotry, the third as witchcraft. But even so the play would not be long enough had I not padded a good deal of buffoonery into the scene where the five corpses are brought back ...
— A Christmas Garland • Max Beerbohm
... also said, "he who increases flesh, increases worms; he who increases riches, increases care; he who increases wives, increases witchcraft; he who increases female servants, increases lewdness; he who increases men servants, increases robbery; but he who increases his knowledge of the law, increases life; he who increases his study in college, increases wisdom; he who increases counsel, increases ...
— Hebrew Literature
... dwells in a stately palace on the summit of the Tiger and Dragon Mountain, in Kiangsi, as the head of one of the three religions. But, alas! the sublime teachings of the founder of Taoism have degenerated into a contemptible mixture of jugglery and witchcraft. ...
— The Awakening of China • W.A.P. Martin
... ointments rubbed over the whole body will very greatly assist the astral body to leave the physical in full consciousness—a fact the knowledge of which seems to have survived even to mediaeval times, as will be seen from the evidence given at some of the trials for witchcraft. But the application to the physical eye might very easily so stimulate its sensitiveness as to make it susceptible to some ...
— Clairvoyance • Charles Webster Leadbeater
... 991. For political reasons he returned to Italy in 996, became archbishop of Ravenna in 998, and the following year was elected to the papal chair. Far ahead of his age in wisdom, he suffered as many such scholars have even in times not so remote by being accused of heresy and witchcraft. As late as 1522, in a biography published at Venice, it is related that by black art he attained the papacy, after having given his soul to the devil.[443] Gerbert was, however, interested in astrology,[444] although this was merely the astronomy of ...
— The Hindu-Arabic Numerals • David Eugene Smith
... occult art, occult sciences; magic, the black art, necromancy, theurgy, thaumaturgy[obs3]; demonology, demonomy[obs3], demonship[obs3]; diablerie[Fr], bedevilment; witchcraft, witchery; glamor; fetishism, fetichism, feticism[obs3]; ghost dance, hoodoo; obi, obiism[obs3]; voodoo, voodooism; Shamanism [Esquimaux], vampirism; conjuration; bewitchery, exorcism, enchantment, mysticism, second sight, mesmerism, animal magnetism; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus • Peter Mark Roget
... iniquity, and began to cry even as had been prophesied by Samuel the prophet; for behold no man could keep that which was his own, for the thieves, and the robbers, and the murderers, and the magic art, and the witchcraft which ...
— The Book Of Mormon - An Account Written By The Hand Of Mormon Upon Plates Taken - From The Plates Of Nephi • Anonymous
... me, good people," said the cat. "I am a human being like yourselves, and have been changed into the shape of a cat by witchcraft, though it was a just return for my wickedness. I was the housekeeper in the palace of a great king a long way from here, and the old woman was the queen's first chambermaid. We were led by avarice to plot together secretly to steal the king's ...
— The Hero of Esthonia and Other Studies in the Romantic Literature of That Country • William Forsell Kirby
... afraid, dear madam. I was not thinking of any witchcraft; but only wishing your children the bright mirror of a clear and settled mind. I think such a mirror would show them that what they take for loyalty and patriotism in their own feelings and conduct, is no more loyalty and patriotism than the dancing ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... Phoebe exclaimed, putting one hand on her sister's arm, "it hath an air of witchcraft! Dost not feel cold chills in ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... peopled with spirits, spooks, hobgoblins, and all the fiery shapes with which the imagination of ignorance and fear could people that horrible place; and the bible teaches the existence of hell and this big devil and all these little devils. The bible teaches the doctrine of witchcraft and makes us believe that there are sorcerers and witches, and that the dead could be raised by the power of sorcery. ...
— Lectures of Col. R. G. Ingersoll - Latest • Robert Green Ingersoll
... age and lost prosperity merely serves to deepen the peculiar impression of the old city, which is not derived from its former commercial importance, but from other associations. Salem village was a famous place in the Puritan annals. The tragedy of the witchcraft tortures and murders has cast upon it a ghostly spell, from which it seems never to have escaped; and even the sojourner of to-day, as he loiters along the shore in the sunniest morning of June, will sometimes feel an icy breath in ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis
... and do hereby declare, Urbain Grandier duly accused and convicted of the crimes of magic and witchcraft, and of causing the persons of certain Ursuline nuns of this town and of other females to become possessed of evil spirits, wherefrom other crimes and offences have resulted. By way of reparation therefor, ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - URBAIN GRANDIER—1634 • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... he grumbled, "or how can you expect a fair trial? Prisoner at the bar, you have been found guilty of witchcraft." ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... Thereafter, till the madness ends, his life belongs wholly to that new-found being, of whom he yet knows nothing, except that the sun's light seems more beautiful when it touches her. From that glamour no mortal science can disenthrall him. But whose the witchcraft? Is it any power in the living idol? No, psychology tells us that it is the power of the dead within the idolater. The dead cast the spell. Theirs the shock in the lover's heart; theirs the electric shiver that tingled through ...
— Kokoro - Japanese Inner Life Hints • Lafcadio Hearn
... tales relating to assaults of people or their houses by imps of darkness. The shadowy leaguers of Gloucester, Massachusetts, kept the garrison of that place in a state of fright until they were expelled from the neighborhood by a silver bullet and a chaplain's prayers. Witchcraft was sometimes manifested in Salem by the hurling of missiles from unseen hands. The "stone-throwing devil" of Portsmouth is the subject of a tradition more than two centuries of age, but, as the stone-thrower appears rather as an avenger than as a gratuitously malignant spirit, he is ill treated ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner
... use, Wilbur, is a sequence on Sirgamesk superstition. Emphasis on voodoo or witchcraft—naked girls dancing—stuff with roots in Earth, but now typically Sirgamesk. Lots of color. ...
— Sjambak • John Holbrook Vance
... that she had not yet reached an inner serenity of faith. She was never able to free herself from a perverted belief in animal magnetism or mesmerism which showed itself in fear rather than faith. She believed herself persecuted and if she did not believe in witchcraft she believed in something curiously like it. Indeed, to Mrs. Eddy belonged the rather curious distinction of having instigated the last trial for witchcraft in the United States and with a fitting sense of historic propriety she staged it at Salem. The judge dismissed the case, saying that it was ...
— Modern Religious Cults and Movements • Gaius Glenn Atkins
... Stalky and Beetle would have fallen upon him, for that song was barred utterly—anathema—the sin of witchcraft. But seeing what he had wrought, they danced round him in silence, waiting till it pleased ...
— Stalky & Co. • Rudyard Kipling
... shape, exaggerated all his foibles fifty-fold, and he, though not liking it, of course not, would yet have preserved a certain manly equanimity. How was it Lady Camper had such power over him?—a lady concealing seventy years with a rouge-box or paint-pot! It was witchcraft in its worst character. He had for six months at her bidding been actually living the life of a beast, degraded in his own esteem; scorched by every laugh he heard; running, pursued, overtaken, and as it were scored or branded, and then let go for the ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... Mayflower, as you might transport yeast. If you walk through Harvard, you will be wise; if you stand on Bunker Hill, treason flees your soul forever; and if you once gaze upon the Common, you are safe from the heresy of the Quaker and the sin of witchcraft." ...
— A Forest Hearth: A Romance of Indiana in the Thirties • Charles Major
... things, have a care of him yourself; for surely there is witchcraft betwixt his lips: He is a wolf within the sheepfold; and therefore I will be earnest, that you may not ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... with this temper of mind that I consider the subject of witchcraft. When I hear the relations that are made from all parts of the world, not only from Norway and Lapland, from the East and West Indies, but from every particular nation in Europe, I cannot forbear thinking ...
— The Coverley Papers • Various
... (For Outdoor or Indoor Production) Chorus of Spirits of the Old Manse Prologue by the Muse of Hawthorne In Witchcraft Days (First Episode) Dance Interlude ...
— Patriotic Plays and Pageants for Young People • Constance D'Arcy Mackay
... distorting every feature of her face, all her beauty vanished away from the eyes of the proud Maltravers, as if by witchcraft: the angel seemed transformed into the fury; and cold, bitter, and withering was the eye which he ...
— Ernest Maltravers, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... century opened, many signs of change were in the air. The third generation of native-born Americans was becoming secularized. The theocracy of New England had failed. In the height of the tragic folly over the supposed "witchcraft" in Salem, Increase Mather and his son Cotton had held up the hands of the judges in their implacable work. But before five years had passed, Judge Sewall does public penance in church for his share of the ...
— The American Spirit in Literature, - A Chronicle of Great Interpreters, Volume 34 in The - Chronicles Of America Series • Bliss Perry
... been my own experience," said Count Victor. "Are you sure her honesty is on more substantial grounds than her reputation for witchcraft? I demand your pardon for expressing these suspicions, but I have reasons. I cannot imagine that the attack of the Macfarlanes was connived at by your servants, though that was my notion for a little when Mungo locked me up, for they suffered more alarm at the attack than I did, and ...
— Doom Castle • Neil Munro
... in which scholars have run riot, are conspicuous for absurdity, even among the wild and ridiculous conjectures as to the personages named by Horace in which the commentators have indulged. That some well-known person was the original of Canidia is extremely probable, for professors of witchcraft abounded at the time, combining very frequently, like their modern successors, the arts of Medea with the attributes of Dame Quickly. What more natural than for a young poet to work up an effective picture out of the abundant suggestions which the current ...
— Horace • Theodore Martin
... changes, and personages. Throughout Europe, and especially in what we call our Mother Country, men were unusually arous'd—(some would say demented.) It was a special age of the insanity of witch-trials and witch-hangings. In one year 60 were hung for witchcraft in one English county alone. It was peculiarly an age of military-religious conflict. Protestantism and Catholicism were wrestling like giants for the mastery, straining every nerve. Only to think of it—that age! its events, persons—Shakspere just dead, (his folios ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman
... to the Tette authorities, and had a stockade at the confluence of the Zambesi and Luenya, a few miles below that village. Asking the Makololo whence they came, Bonga rejoined, "Why do you come from my enemy to me? You have brought witchcraft medicine to kill me." In vain they protested that they did not belong to the country; they were strangers, and had come from afar with an Englishman. The superstitious savage put them all to death. "We do not grieve," ...
— A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries • David Livingstone
... mule, which you see, was our brother, which some women by witchcraft have brought into this condition which you see: we therefore entreat you ...
— The Forbidden Gospels and Epistles, Complete • Archbishop Wake
... 'Christabel' as little as the other, seeing that it is a tale of witchcraft. How would you relish that grand anthem to nature's God, written in the vale ...
— Beulah • Augusta J. Evans
... Unveileth Psyche with the agate lamp. Which one of you can spread a spotted cloak And raise an unaccounted incense smoke Until within the twilight of the day Stands dark Ligeia in her disarray, Witchcraft and desperate passion in her breath And battling ...
— General William Booth enters into Heaven and other Poems • Vachel Lindsay
... Lady," said Doctor Lundin, "that you should suppress it longer—nothing may more endanger the frame of your honoured body; and truly, if there be witchcraft in this matter, it is held by the vulgar, and even by solid authors on Demonology, that three scruples of the ashes of the witch, when she hath been well and carefully burned at a stake, is a grand Catholicon in such matter, ...
— The Abbot • Sir Walter Scott
... propensities so likely to be attracted by the female of a foreign stock, as by one of his own, who is more nearly conformed to himself. Shakspeare spoke the language of nature, when he made the senate and people of Venice attribute to the effect of witchcraft, Desdemona's passion for Othello—though, as Coleridge has said, we are to conceive of him not as a negro, but as a high ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... Queen of Hearts, with a nail of Iron knocked through the forehead, and thus fastened to the bottom of the chair: they durst not pull it out, remembering that her like thing was used to the old Countess of Sussex, and afterwards proved a witchcraft, for which certain persons ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 20, March 16, 1850 • Various
... and supper, the entire school, instead of being allowed to pursue fancy work, was summoned to the lecture hall, and harangued by Miss Beasley upon the follies and dangers of superstition. She touched upon ancient beliefs in witchcraft, and modern credulity in clairvoyance and spiritualism, and placed an equal ban ...
— The Madcap of the School • Angela Brazil
... that when the legislature abolished the cruel laws against witchcraft, they had no hope of destroying the superstitious feelings of humanity on which such chimeras had been founded; and to prevent those feelings from being tampered with by artful and designing persons, it is enacted by the ninth of George the Second, chap. 5, that whosoever shall pretend, ...
— The Antiquary, Complete • Sir Walter Scott
... Machlinia, Wynkyn de Worde, Pynson, Julyan Notary, Verard, etc.; an extensive Collection of Old English Poetry; Romances; Historical and Theological Tracts; early Voyages and Travels; curious Treatises on Witches and Witchcraft; some of the earliest Dictionaries and Vocabularies in the English Language, etc. Likewise several Manuscripts on vellum, most beautifully illuminated, etc.' The number of lots in this sale was sixteen hundred and sixty-five, and the sum realised three thousand three ...
— English Book Collectors • William Younger Fletcher
... express our religious beliefs date from periods when comets and eclipses were believed to have been sent to portend calamity; when every great meteorological change was attributed to some isolated spiritual agency; when witchcraft and diabolical possession, supernatural diseases, and supernatural cures were deemed indubitable facts: and when accounts of contemporary miracles, Divine or Satanic, carried with them no sense of strangeness or improbability. It is scarcely surprising that these ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky
... there that the matrons, whose great age justified their experience, insisted on proving, by absurd tales, that they knew all the marvellous secrets for causing happiness or for curing sickness. Consequently, in those days the most enlightened rustic never for a moment doubted the truth of witchcraft. ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... the seventeenth century the belief in witchcraft was widespread, and among the more ignorant well-nigh universal. The superstition was, moreover, fostered by the clergy, who, in adopting this policy, were undoubtedly actuated by mixed motives. Their credulity probably made them for the most ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams
... glorious animal," must not go to the chapter which contains that record for his evidences and proofs. If he should be in search of materials for humiliation and abasement, he will find in the history of witchcraft in this country, from the beginning to the end of the seventeenth century, large and abundant materials, whether it affects the species or the individual. In truth, human nature is never seen in worse colours than in that ...
— Discovery of Witches - The Wonderfull Discoverie of Witches in the Countie of Lancaster • Thomas Potts
... against Engleton and the passengers," replied the guard. "He played his hand, if you come to look at it; and I wish he had shot worse, or me better. And yet I'll go to my grave but what I covered him," he cried. "It looks like witchcraft. I'll go to my grave but what he was drove full ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume XXI • Robert Louis Stevenson
... As, in amaze, they stand around; One prates of gnomes and sorceries, Another of the sable hound. What matters it, though witlings rail, Though one his suit 'gainst witchcraft press, If his sole tingle none the less, If his sure footing also fail? Ye of all swaying Nature feel The secret working, never-ending, And, from her lowest depths up-tending, E'en now her living trace doth steal. If sudden cramps your limbs surprise, If ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... witches and wizards, by putting into possession of every foolish informer the means of punishment. In several countries of Europe, these statutes still subsist; they were not abolished in Britain till a period still at no great distance. Since the abolition of persecution, the faith of witchcraft has disappeared even among the vulgar. It was long found inconsistent with any considerable progress ...
— Thaumaturgia • An Oxonian
... "The moon of her brow, it is beaming 'Neath the bright-litten heaven of her forehead: So she gleams in her white robe, and gazes With a glance that is keen as the falcon's. But the star that is shining upon me What spell shall it work by its witchcraft? Ah, that moon of her brow shall be mighty With mischief to her—and ...
— The Life and Death of Cormac the Skald • Unknown
... her dark eyes upon me, her head held high. "My mother died when I was born; my father, years ago. I was the King's ward. While the Queen lived she kept me with her,—she loved me, I think; and the King too was kind,—would have me sing to him, and would talk to me about witchcraft and the Scriptures, and how rebellion to a king is rebellion to God. When I was sixteen, and he tendered me marriage with a Scotch lord, I, who loved the gentleman not, never having seen him, prayed ...
— To Have and To Hold • Mary Johnston
... wide-spread. It was common among the Romans, being given in the XII. Tables as the special penalty for arson. Under the Gothic codes adulterers were so punished, and throughout the middle ages it was the civil penalty for certain heinous crimes, e.g. poisoning, heresy, witchcraft, arson, bestiality and sodomy, and so continued in some cases, nominally at least, till the beginning of the 19th century. In England, under the common law, women condemned for high treason or petty treason (murder of husband, murder of ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 4 - "Bulgaria" to "Calgary" • Various
... them there was said to be one man Of wonderful endowments:—birth and fortune, Youth, strength, and beauty, almost superhuman, And courage as unrivalled, were proclaimed His by the public rumour; and his sway, Not only over his associates, but His judges, was attributed to witchcraft, Such was his influence:—I have no great faith 250 In any magic save that of the mine— I therefore deemed him wealthy.—But my soul Was roused with various feelings to seek out This prodigy, ...
— The Works of Lord Byron - Poetry, Volume V. • Lord Byron
... sorely distracted by a trouble which, though not uncommon in those days, is one which we find it difficult to realise at the present time. His mother, Catherine Kepler, had attained undesirable notoriety by the suspicion that she was guilty of witchcraft. Years were spent in legal investigations, and it was only after unceasing exertions on the part of the astronomer for upwards of a twelvemonth that he was finally able to procure her acquittal and ...
— Great Astronomers • R. S. Ball
... experience and knowledge, as it seems; nevertheless your well-meant advice will hardly meet with acceptance here. For first the old man of the mountain will never have anything to do with sorcery and witchcraft, because he hates every kind of superstition, even that which is pious and unavoidable, much more then one of this sort, which he must needs hold to be utterly accurst. Besides you don't even know in what way the thief goes ...
— The Old Man of the Mountain, The Lovecharm and Pietro of Abano - Tales from the German of Tieck • Ludwig Tieck
... miracle-working line is modern Spiritualism. Multitudes of people of all classes are believers in this soul-destroying doctrine. The system is generally acknowledged to be but a modern form of what was anciently styled witchcraft, necromancy, magic, etc., while the mediums of to-day are of the same class as those formerly known as "witches," "sorcerers," "magicians." This they themselves often admit. The system is so well known both in doctrine and in its pernicious effects that I will not devote further space ...
— The Revelation Explained • F. Smith
... even of that," and she smiled mockingly; "sometimes I have a fancy it may be witchcraft. I only know I am haunted—have been haunted four long weeks by a face, a voice, and two ...
— The Bondwoman • Marah Ellis Ryan
... decide that he shall be rewarded by a monthly allowance. He embraced what was then the losing side in the chariot races and carried it to victory—victory which he won so often that envious rivals declared that he conquered by means of witchcraft. ...
— The Letters of Cassiodorus - Being A Condensed Translation Of The Variae Epistolae Of - Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator • Cassiodorus (AKA Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus Senator)
... Goethe's drama, is entirely wanting in Marlowe's, and so is the subtle conception of Goethe's Mephistophiles. Marlowe's handling of the supernatural is materialistic and downright, as befitted an age which believed in witchcraft. The {106} greatest part of the English Faustus is the last scene, in which the agony and terror of suspense with which the magician awaits the stroke of the clock that signals his doom are ...
— Brief History of English and American Literature • Henry A. Beers
... curse! I've wept, to think our fellow-men could be So bitter, false. For thou hadst scarce set sail, When, sudden, all men's talk throughout the land Was of wild deeds and hideous midnight crimes— The fruit of witchcraft on far Colchis' shores— Which thou hadst done.—And, last, a woman, dark And dreadful, so they said, thou took'st to wife, Brewer of poisons, slayer of her sire. What was her name? It had a ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... Ishmael, begging of your pardon, dat was the curiousest t'ing of all! I dunno no more how I come out'n dat dark den, nor de man in de moon! I t'ink it was witchcraft and debbilment, dat's what I t'ink," whispered Katie, rolling ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... last, seemed to be a very uncommon and precious piece of jewelry; it was made of pure gold, minutely chased and threaded with curious workmanship, in form like a melon, and bearing what seemed to be characters of some foreign language: there might be a spell, or even witchcraft, in it, and the sooner it was out of her keeping the better. Nevertheless she took very good care of it, wrapping it in lamb's-wool, and peeping at it many times a day, to be sure that it was safe, until it made her think of the owner so much, and the many wonders she had ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore
... molest them, and rested at the island, an unwelcome guest, through all the long winter. Early in the spring he sailed eastward to the Gulf of Riga and spread fear and terror along the coast of Finland. And the old saga tells how the Finlanders "conjured up in the night, by their witchcraft, a dreadful storm and bad weather; but the king ordered all the anchors to be weighed and sail hoisted, and beat off all night to the outside of the land. So the king's luck prevailed ...
— Historic Boys - Their Endeavours, Their Achievements, and Their Times • Elbridge Streeter Brooks
... too, here as elsewhere, wilt thou find the potency of Names; which indeed are but one kind of such custom-woven, wonder-hiding Garments. Witchcraft, and all manner of Spectre-work, and Demonology, we have now named Madness, and Diseases of the Nerves. Seldom reflecting that still the new question comes upon us: What is Madness, what are Nerves? Ever, as before, does Madness remain a mysterious-terrific, altogether infernal ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... fell, it lay unhurt on one of the soft sandhills that ringed the bay; but no sign of the child was to be seen. Katipah was laughing when she picked up her kite and ran home. And Bimsha thought, "Is it witchcraft, or did the child fall into ...
— The Blue Moon • Laurence Housman
... magic powder concealed about their persons. He adds, that the sailors attributed all the delays and hardships experienced on that coast to their being under the influence of some evil spell, worked by the witchcraft of the natives, and that they still ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... pieces of the broom bush, which you saw growing on the old castle of Auchinleck. The wood has a curious appearance when sawn across. You may either have a little writing-stand made of it, or get it formed into boards for a treatise on witchcraft, by way of ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell, Edited by Birkbeck Hill
... belief in witchcraft was universal then, and she began to fear whether Harry had been under Satanic influence. At length she said, "I should like to see this old woman, if she be a witch, and ask her where ...
— Hayslope Grange - A Tale of the Civil War • Emma Leslie
... light sound behind her. She trembled. By some Night-witchcraft her vision a fact had become. On a sudden she felt, without turning to view, That a man was approaching behind her. She knew By the fluttering pulse which she could not restrain, And the quick-beating heart, that this man was Eugene. Her first instinct was flight; but she felt her slight foot ...
— Lucile • Owen Meredith
... "What witchcraft is this!" cried the King, spurring his steed cruelly. But the animal, like the dogs, obeyed the Hermit's will ...
— John of the Woods • Abbie Farwell Brown
... St. Dunstan had a curious clock, which was considered a very wonderful piece of mechanism, almost a work of witchcraft. Standing out on the side of the church, in full view of the passers-by, were two figures of Hercules, holding clubs, with which they struck on two bells the hours and the quarters. All children took delight in ...
— Stories and Legends of Travel and History, for Children • Grace Greenwood
... by the saints. Scattered also among their pale-faced enemies were the Indian priests, or powwows, who had often scared their native forest with more hideous incantations than any known to English witchcraft. ...
— Mosses from an Old Manse and Other Stories • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... convicted of many and hideous crimes — witchcraft, sorcery, treachery to your King, vile cruelty to his subjects — crimes for which death alone is scarce punishment enough. You well merit a worse fate than the gallows. You well merit some of those lingering agonies that you have inflicted upon your wretched victims, and have rejoiced ...
— In the Days of Chivalry • Evelyn Everett-Green
... which is said to exist all the way between Cockhoolet Castle and Edinburgh—the private telegraph of those days, when wires in the air or under the sea by which to send messages would have cost the inventors their lives as guilty of witchcraft. While shaking hands with this old woman and speaking to her, you lost sight of her and the present time and felt the air of the sixteenth century blow in your face. Mary came up before you in moving habit as she lived—the young Mary who caught all hearts, not heartless ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... winter, always a time for enjoyment in the days of old Guernsey, when evening after evening, people met together at the Veilles, to knit and sing and to tell stories of witchcraft and weird tales ...
— Where Deep Seas Moan • E. Gallienne-Robin
... Thomas Manners was created by Henry VIII. the first Earl of Rutland, and he restored the castle, which had for some time been in ruins. His son enlarged it, making a noble residence. The sixth Earl of Rutland had two sons, we are told, who were murdered by witchcraft at Belvoir through the sorcery of three female servants in revenge for their dismissal. The three "witches" were tried and committed to Lincoln jail. They were a mother and two daughters, and the mother before going to the jail wished the bread ...
— England, Picturesque and Descriptive - A Reminiscence of Foreign Travel • Joel Cook
... still, oh still, "Look love upon me," sweet and kind!— Let thy glad thought, in music, thrill Bright witchcraft through my longing mind. I clasp thee to my breast—in dreams! Thy lips rain kisses warm and fast— And I half hate the morning beams That scare thee to ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 5 November 1848 • Various
... some witchcraft must be at work, and he hastened away before the return of the shepherdess, who became that evening the butt ...
— The Green Fairy Book • Various
... in the witch-mania of the 17th century, but through the whole middle age. It is a detestable page of history. I ask those who may think my statement exaggerated, to consult the original authorities. Let them contrast Rothar's law about the impossibility of witchcraft, with the pages of the Malleus Maleficarum, Nider's Fornicarium, or Delrio the Jesuit, and see for themselves who were the false teachers. And if they be told, that the cruelties of the Inquisition were only those in vogue ...
— The Roman and the Teuton - A Series of Lectures delivered before the University of Cambridge • Charles Kingsley
... hardly have known you; verily you look as if you were troubled; and I beleeve you have the feeling of a first lying-in through all your joints. Well Cousin, saies the t'other, it seems that you are deeply studied in the Art of Witchcraft, for I fear its too true. I went from home on purpose to take my pleasure for three weeks or a month, that I might store my self with fresh provisions, and sing a sweet ditty in commendations of my Betty. Ho, Ho, saith Master Barebreech, flatter not your self with ...
— The Ten Pleasures of Marriage and The Confession of the New-married Couple (1682) • A. Marsh
... the lay brother who had accompanied him. In his mind there were dark thoughts. "This cannot be a true miracle," he thought, "since it is revealed to malefactors. This does not come from God, but has its origin in witchcraft and is sent hither by Satan. It is the Evil One's power that is tempting us and compelling us to see that which ...
— Christmas in Legend and Story - A Book for Boys and Girls • Elva S. Smith
... intended to ridicule magical arts, and those who believed in them. He was likely to feel keenly on this subject, for having married a rich widow, Pudentilla, her relatives accused him of having obtained her by witchcraft, and even dragged him into ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... your comfortable seven-by-nine lodgings, which seems like a palace, draw the comfortable rug about you, and fall asleep, with old Ocean for a lullaby, to dream (if your waking hours are fortunately of that bent) of some old deserted castle, "Salem witchcraft," or a lone "Grace Pool," attendant within the ...
— Natalie - A Gem Among the Sea-Weeds • Ferna Vale
... shamed, I am shamed. I'll go wash my hands. Shut your trap and get you gone down your rat-run, Thomas Bolle, and, living or dead, never dare to speak to me again. Also forget not to tell your monks how I called you to my side—for that's witchcraft, you know, and I shall burn for it, and your soul gain benefit. God in heaven! to think that once you were Thomas Bolle," and she made as ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... you dog! What do you mean by hiding up like that? It is one of your infernal tricks; be careful"—tapping his pistol case—"or I shall one day put an end to you and your witchcraft together." ...
— Jess • H. Rider Haggard
... the enraged emperor, "is the son of witchcraft, and I am determined to make an example ...
— Frank Mildmay • Captain Frederick Marryat
... fact is, Cuthbertson, Craven's a devout believer in the department of witchcraft called medical science. He's celebrated in all the medical schools as an example of the newest sort of liver complaint. The doctors say he can't last another year; and he has fully made up his mind not to survive next Easter, just to ...
— The Philanderer • George Bernard Shaw
... might never be warm, is perhaps a good story for a ballad, because it is a well-known tale: but is the author certain that it is 'well authenticated?' and does not such an assertion promote the popular superstition of witchcraft? ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... of stream to propel vessels against both wind and current, and machinery to do all manner of work had not been thought of. The instantaneous transmission of messages around the world by means of electricity would probably at that day have been attributed to witchcraft or a league with the Devil. Immaterial circumstances had changed as greatly as material ones. We could not and ought not to be rigidly bound by the rules laid down under circumstances so different for emergencies so utterly unanticipated. The fathers themselves ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... quotation from Jean Paul about the 'lark's nest' makes me smile. You would have been much nearer the truth if you had pictured me as dwelling in an owl's nest; for mine is about as dismal, and like the owl I seldom venture abroad till after dusk. By some witchcraft or other—for I really cannot assign any reasonable why and wherefore—I have been carried apart from the main current of life, and find it impossible to get back again. Since we last met, which you remember was in Sawtell's room, where you read a farewell poem to the ...
— A Study Of Hawthorne • George Parsons Lathrop
... was a whole world in little, and centuries had enriched it with wealth, beauty, and the noblest treasures of art and learning. Magic and witchcraft hedged it in with a maze of mystical and symbolical secrets, and philosophy had woven a tissue of speculation round the person of the god. The sanctuary was indeed the centre of Hellenic culture in the city of Alexander; what marvel then, that the heathen should believe that with ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... the stone monsters of the church. Imbued from her very infancy with the superstitions of the Bohemian tribe, her first thought was that she had caught the strange beings peculiar to the night, in their deeds of witchcraft. Then she ran in terror to cower in her cell, asking of her ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo
... I hadn't any women belonging to me, nor any place but that to put her in. She stayed there till spring working for her keep, growing brighter, prettier, every day, and fonder of me I thought. If I believed in witchcraft, I shouldn't think myself such a cursed fool as I do now, but I don't believe in it, and to this day I can't understand how I came to do it. To be sure I was a lonely man, without kith or kin, had never had a sweetheart in my life, or been much with ...
— On Picket Duty and Other Tales • Louisa May Alcott
... the next thing to it, wrinkling up his black-whiskered face into a caricature, yelling a Greek monologue in a refrain consisting of five notes repeated over and over, and dancing around in a wide ring with one leg shorter than the other and his arms executing symbols of witchcraft. ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy |
