ath; or, without really conducting them thither, so strike their
imagination and mislead their senses, that they think they move, see,
and hear, when they do not stir from their places, see no object and
hear no sound.

Observe, also, that the Parliament of Aix did not pass any sentence
against even that young girl, it being their custom to inflict no
other punishment on those who suffered themselves to be seduced and
dishonored than the shame with which they were loaded ever after. In
regard to the cure Gaufredi, in the account which they render to the
chancellor of the sentence given by them, they say that this cure was
in truth accused of sorcery; but that he had been condemned to the
flames, as being arraigned and convicted of spiritual incest with
Magdalen de la Palud, his penitent.[224]

Footnotes:

[218] Causes Celebres, tom. vi. p. 192.

[219] Job i. 12, 13, 22.

[220] 2 Cor. xii. 7, 8.

[221] John xiii. 2.

[222] Matt. xxiv. 5.

[223] Luke xxi.

[224] The attentive reader of this horrible narrative will hardly fail
to conclude that Gaufredi's fault was chiefly his seduction of
Mademoiselle de la Palud, and that the rest was the effect of a heated
imagination. The absurd proportions of the "_Sabbath_" bell will be
sufficient to show this. If the bell were metallic, it would have
weighed many tons, and a _wooden_ bell of such dimensions, even were
it capable of sounding, would weigh many hundred weight.

CHAPTER XXI.

REASONS WHICH PROVE THE POSSIBILITY OF SORCERERS AND WITCHES BEING
TRANSPORTED TO THE SABBATH.

All that has just been said is more fitted to prove that the going of
sorcerers and witches to the sabbath is only an illusion and a
deranged imagination on the part of these persons, and malice and
deceit on that of the devil, who misleads them, and persuades them to
yield themselves to him, and renounce true religion, by the lure of
vain promises that he will enrich them, load them with honors,
pleasures, and prosperity, rather than to convince us of the reality
of the corporeal transportation of these persons to what they call the
sabbath.

Here are some arguments and examples which seem to prove, at least,
that the transportation of sorcerers to the sabbath is not impossible;
for the impossibility of this transportation is one of the strongest
objections which is made to the opinion that supposes it.

There is no difficulty in believing that God may allow the demon to
mi