themselves guilty of the crime imputed to them; and it being
affirmed that poison had in fact been found in a well at
Zoffingen, this was deemed a sufficient proof to convince the
world; and the persecution of the abhorred culprits thus appeared
justifiable. Now, though we can take as little exception at these
proceedings as at the multifarious confessions of witches, because
the interrogatories of the fanatical and sanguinary tribunals were
so complicated, that by means of the rack the required answer must
inevitably be obtained; and it is, besides, conformable to human
nature that crimes which are in everybody's mouth may, in the end,
be actually committed by some, either from wantonness, revenge, or
desperate exasperation: yet crimes and accusations are, under
circumstances like these, merely the offspring of a revengeful,
frenzied spirit in the people; and the accusers, according to the
fundamental principles of morality, which are the same in every
age, are the more guilty transgressors.

Already in the autumn of 1348 a dreadful panic, caused by this
supposed empoisonment, seized all nations; in Germany especially
the springs and wells were built over, that nobody might drink of
them or employ their contents for culinary purposes; and for a
long time the inhabitants of numerous towns and villages used only
river and rain water. The city gates were also guarded with the
greatest caution: only confidential persons were admitted; and if
medicine or any other article, which might be supposed to be
poisonous, was found in the possession of a stranger--and it was
natural that some should have these things by them for their
private use--they were forced to swallow a portion of it. By this
trying state of privation, distrust, and suspicion, the hatred
against the supposed poisoners became greatly increased, and often