e
accusation; and Bossuet (_Variations des Eglises
Protestantes_, xi. 201), who is assured that St. Paul
predicted the 'doctrines of devils' to be characteristic of
Manichaean and Albigensian heresy, might have more safely
interpreted the prophecy as applicable to the universal
Christian Church (at least of Western Europe) of the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

The followers of Calvin were most deeply imbued with hatred and
horror of Catholic practices, and, adopting the old prejudice or
policy of their antagonists, they were willing to confound the
superstitious rites of Catholicism with those of demonolatry. The
Anglican Church party, whose principles were not so entirely
opposite to the old religion, had far less antipathy: until the
revolution of 1688 it was for the most part engaged in contending
against liberty rather than against despotism of conscience;
against Calvinism than against Catholicism. Yet the Church of
England is exposed to the reproach of having sanctioned the
common opinions in the most authoritative manner. In the
authorised version of the Sacred Scriptures, in the translation
of which into the English language forty-seven selected divines,
eminent for position and learning, could concur in consecrating
a vulgar superstition, the most imposing sanction was given.
Had they possessed either common sense or courage, these Anglican
divines might have expressed their disbelief or doubt of
its truth by a more rational, and possibly more proper,
interpretation of the Hebrew and Greek expressions; or if that
was not possible, by an accompanying unequivocal protest. But the
subservience as well as superstition of the English Church under
the last of the Tudors and under the Stuarts is equally a matter
of fact and of reprobation.

It was in the first year of the first King of Great Britain that
the English Parliament passed the Act which remained in force, or
at least on the Statute Book, until towards the middle of last
century.[115] After due consideration the bill passed both
Houses; and by it, it was enacted that 'If any person shall use
any invocation or conjuration of any evil or wicked spirit, or
shall consult, covenant with, entertain, employ, feed, or reward
any evil or cursed spirit to or for any intent or purpose, or
take up any dead man, woman, or child out of the grave--or the
skin, bone, or any part of the dead person, to be employed or
used in any manner of witchcraf