MAGIC   AND    WITCHCRAFT.  45

The  natural  result,  I  think,  of  such  modes  of
thought  would  be,  that  the  notion  of  sorcery  should
be  very  common,  but  that  the  fear  of  it  should  not
pass  into  an  absolute  mania.  Credulity  was  habitual
and  universal,  but  religious  terrorism  was  fitful  and
transient.  We  need  not,  therefore,  be  surprised  that
sorcery,  though  very  familiar  to  the  minds  of  men,
did  not,  at  the  period  I  am  referring  to,  occupy  that
prominent  position  which  it  afterwards  assumed.  The
idea  of  a  formal  compact  with  the  devil  had  not  yet
been  formed ;  but  most  of  the  crimes  of  witchcraft
were  recognised,  anathematised,  and  punished.  Thus,
towards  the  end  of  the  sixth  century,  a  son  of  Frede-
gonde  died  after  a  short  illness ;  and  numbers  of  women
were  put  to  the  most  prolonged  and  excruciating
torments,  and  at  last  burnt  or  broken  on  the  wheel,  for
having  caused,  by  incantations,  the  death  of  the  prince.1
In  Germany,  the  Codex  de  Maihematicis  et  Maleficiis2
long  continued  in  force,  as  did  the  old  Salic  law
on  the  same  subject  in  France.  Charlemagne  enacted
new  and  very  stringent  laws,  condemning  sorcerers  to
death,  and  great  numbers  seem  to  have  perished  in
his  reign.3  Hail  and  thunderstorms  were  almost
universally  attributed  to  their  devices,  though  one
great  ecclesiastic  of  the  ninth  centuiy — Agobard,


1  Garinet,  pp.  14,  15.
2  This  was  the  title  of  the  Roman  code  I  have  reviewed.     Mathe-
maticus  was  the  name  given  to  astrologers  :  as  a  law  of  Diocletian
put  it,  '  artem  geometries  disci  atque  exerceri  publice  interest.     Ars
autem  mathematica  damnabilis  est  et  iuterdicta  omnino.'

3  Garinet,  p.  39.
46  KATIONALISM   IN   EUROPE.
