f this heresy was assumed by
the Church, the Inquisition, as its punitive organ, took charge of the
matter and showed little mercy in its dealings with suspected persons,
for whom the rack and other instruments of torture were put to frequent
use. In the year 1507 the Inquisition of Calahorra burned more than
thirty women as sorceresses and magicians, and twenty years later, in
Navarre, there were similar condemnations. So frequent, indeed, were
these arrests for magic and sorcery, that the "sect of sorcerers," as it
was called, seemed to be making great headway throughout the whole
country, and the Inquisition called upon all good Christians to lodge
information with the proper authorities whenever they "heard that any
person had familiar spirits, and that he invoked demons in circles,
questioning them and expecting their answer, as a magician, or in virtue
of an express or tacit compact." It was also their duty to report anyone
who "constructed or procured mirrors, rings, phials, or other vessels
for the purpose of attracting, enclosing, and preserving a demon, who
replies to his questions and assists him in obtaining his wishes; or who
had endeavored to discover the future by interrogating demons in
possessed people; or tried to produce the same effect by invoking the
devil under the name of _holy angel_ or _white angel_, and by asking
things of him with prayers and humility, by practising other
superstitious ceremonies with vases, phials of water, or consecrated
tapers; by the inspection of the nails, and of the palm of the hand
rubbed with vinegar, or by endeavoring to obtain representations of
objects by means of phantoms in order to learn secret things or which
had not then happened." Such orders led to the arrest of hundreds of
women all over Spain, and many of them went to death in the flames, for
women rather than men were affected by this crusade, as they were
generally the adepts in these matters of the black art. That such things
could be in Spain at this time may cause some surprise, but it must be
remembered that superstition dies hard and that many of the things which
are here condemned are still advertised in the columns of the
newspapers, and the belief in the supernatural seems to have taken a new
lease of life as the result of certain modern investigations.
Superstition has ever gone hand in hand with civilization, in spite of
the repeated efforts of the latter to go its way alone.

Witches and sorce