No More Learning

In the famous _Demonology_[85] he allied himself unhesitatingly with
the cause of superstition. Witchcraft was of course not without
its opponents, but these were for the most part obscure men and of
little personal influence. While Bacon and Raleigh were inclining
to a belief in witchcraft, and Sir Thomas Browne was offering his
support to persecution, the cause of reason was intrusted to such
champions as Reginald Scot, the author of the famous _Discovery of
Witchcraft_, 1584, a work which fearlessly exposes the prevailing
follies and crimes. It is on this side that Jonson places himself. That
he should make a categorical statement as to his belief or disbelief
in witchcraft is not to be expected. It is enough that he presents
a picture of the pretended demoniac, that he makes it as sordid and
hateful as possible, that he draws for us in the person of Justice
Eitherside the portrait of the bigoted, unreasonable, and unjust judge,
and that he openly ridicules the series of cases which he used as the
source of his witch scenes (cf. Act. 5. Sc. 3).

To form an adequate conception of the poet's satirical purpose in
this play one should compare the methods used here with the treatment
followed in Jonson's other dramas where the witch motive occurs.
In _The Masque of Queens_, 1609, and in _The Sad Shepherd_, Jonson
employed the lore of witchcraft more freely, but in a quite different
way. Here, instead of hard realism with all its hideous details, the
more picturesque beliefs and traditions are used for purely imaginative
and poetical purposes.

_The Masque of Queens_ was presented at Whitehall, and dedicated to
Prince Henry. Naturally Jonson's attitude toward witchcraft would here
be respectful.
It is to be observed, however, that in the copious notes
which are appended to the masque no contemporary trials are referred
to. The poet relies upon the learned compilations of Bodin, Remigius,
Cornelius Agrippa, and Paracelsus, together with many of the classical
authors. He is clearly dealing with the mythology of witchcraft.
Nightshade and henbane, sulphur, vapors, the eggshell boat, and the
cobweb sail are the properties which he uses in this poetic drama.
The treatment does not differ essentially from that of Middleton and
Shakespeare.

In _The Sad Shepherd_ the purpose is still different. We have none of
the wild unearthliness of the masque. Maudlin is a witch of a decidedly
vulgar type, but there is no satirical intent. Jonson, for the purpose
of his play, accepts for the moment the prevailing attitude toward
witchcraft, and the satisfaction in Maudlin's discomfiture doubtless
assumed an acquiescence in the popular belief. At the same time the
poetical aspect is not wholly forgotten, and appears with especial
prominence in the beautiful passage which describes the witch's forest
haunt, beginning: 'Within a gloomy dimble she doth dwell'. _The Sad
Shepherd_ and the masque are far more akin to each other in their
treatment of witchcraft than is either to _The Devil is an Ass_.

[84] See _Trials for Witchcraft 1596-7_, vol. 1, _Miscellany of the
Spalding Club_, Aberdeen, 1841.

[85] First appeared in 1597. _Workes_, fol. ed.