Bedouret into a private room, held her
down upon some burning straw, and placed a red-hot iron across her
mouth. The unhappy woman soon died in extreme agony. The Soubervies
confessed, and indeed, exulted in their act. At their trials they
obtained the highest possible characters. It was shown that they had
been actuated solely by superstition, and it was urged that they only
followed the highest ecclesiastical precedent. The jury recommended them
to mercy, and they were only sentenced to pay twenty-five francs a year
to the husband of the victim, and to be imprisoned for four months. In
1850!!

A great many may remember the "Hex" murder case near Lancaster,
Pennsylvania, in 1930! This is scarcely different from an incident which
had occurred in 1892 in Wemding, Germany: An hysterical woman was
"exorcised" by the Capuchin Father Aurelian, who accused a peasant woman
of bewitching him.

* * * * *

The foregoing has shown that witchcraft is not an isolated incident in
the history of Christianity, as the ecclesiastics would have us believe,
but is a vital part of their religion. Witchcraft bears the same
relation to Christianity that an arm bears to the body; neither can be
removed without destroying the symmetrical aspect of the whole.

Witchcraft is an integral part of the Christian religion, but its
falsity has become so obvious that even the most devout have had to
abandon it. Yet the other precepts are still maintained; and in the
Bible which is claimed to be infallible, something is forgotten and
discarded, something is declared to be ridiculous. And yet they call the
Bible infallible. Again, if witchcraft is given up, why not the chief
witch of the Bible, the Devil? Yet if this be yielded, then the idea of
Atonement, the central doctrine of the Christian Church, must also go.

"Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." If this be God's word, did God
err when He said it? If He erred, He probably did so in many other
things; if He did not Christians must either still maintain the
Witchcraft Delusion or deny the Bible Delusion.

The Witchcraft Delusion is denied and forgotten, and no one thinks of
quoting, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." But the Bible Delusion
despite all manner of ecclesiastical sophistry still maintains that man
was created miraculously some 6000 years ago from the dust of the earth,
that woman was made from a bone taken from the side of man, that
language