had been in his house with the company of 'the Good Lady', and had
seen him naked and covered him up, 'How, then, did you get in when
all the doors were locked?' 'We can get in,' she said, 'even if the
doors are locked.' Then the priest took her into the chancel of the
church, locked the door, and gave her a sound thrashing with the
pastoral staff, calling out 'Out with you, lady witch.' But as she
could not, he sent her home, saying 'See now how foolish you are to
believe in such empty dreams'. [19]

But as the Church increased in strength, as heresies arose, and
consequent persecution, then the secret meetings of these sectarians,
as we should now call them, were identified by the hierarchy with the
rites of sorcery and magic, and with the relics of the worship of the
old gods. By the time, too, that the hierarchy was established, that
belief in the fallen angel, the Arch-Fiend, the Devil, originally so
foreign to the nations of the West, had become thoroughly ingrafted
on the popular mind, and a new element of wickedness and superstition
was introduced at those unholy festivals. About the middle of the
thirteenth century, we find the mania for persecuting heretics
invading the tribes of Teutonic race from France and Italy, backed by
all the power of the Pope. Like jealousy, persecution too often makes
the meat it feeds on, and many silly, if not harmless, superstitions
were rapidly put under the ban of the Church. Now the 'Good Lady' and
her train begin to recede, they only fill up the background while the
Prince of Darkness steps, dark and terrible, in front, and soon draws
after him the following of the ancient goddess. Now we hear stories
of demoniac possession; now the witches adore a demon of the other
sex. With the male element, and its harsher, sterner nature, the
sinfulness of these unholy assemblies is infinitely increased; folly
becomes guilt, and guilt crime. [20]