A Legacy to the Friends of Free Discussion: Principal Historical Facts and Personages of the Books Known as The Old and New Testament; With Remarks on the Morality of NatureOffen, Benjamin
Religion
A Legacy to the Friends of Free Discussion: Principal Historical Facts and Personages of the Books Known as The Old and New Testament; With Remarks on the Morality of Nature
Offen, Benjamin
Bible -- Criticism, interpretation, etc.
Another fact will now be stated, to show what ideas of the Devil’s
influence prevailed in England and Scotland, in the days of Elizabeth.
James the First, of England, who, succeeding Elizabeth, was born in
1566, was the only direct heir to the Crown of Scotland, and had a
prospect of succeeding Elizabeth in England, which he did on the death
of the Queen. James had witnessed a great number of prosecutions for
witchcraft, in Scotland, in the reign of Mary; and he, as might be
expected, most firmly believed that the Devil was very active in the
country of his birth; so that, when he came to the Crown of England, his
mind was di-rected to put a stop to the prevailing crime of witchcraft
and to break up the Devil’s Sabbath, he believing that numbers of his
English subjects were visitors to those unholy meetings. A circumstance
will now be mentioned which will fully prove what views the people of
England and Scotland had of the activity of the Devil in drawing persons
into his service and kingdom; for it is impossible to evade the truth,
that the existence and opposition of the Devil against the progress of
the Gospel, was strengthened by what had been recorded of the Devil in
the New Testament.
James the First, of England, is here cited to show what was then the
prevailing opinion of the existence of witchcraft in that kingdom. And
although it is painful to reflect on the sufferings of thousands, it
may, by its recital, assist those who are still somewhat in darkness, to
discover how the human race have been deluded. James the First had fixed
his mind on a daughter of the King of Denmark. A splendid embassy was
sent from England to conclude the treaty of marriage, and to bring home
James’s royal consort; but the ships met with violent storms, and
instead of arriving at the capital of Scotland, the news came that the
ship in which the Princess had taken passage, was driven back on the
coast of Norway; nothing uncommon m these seas at that, season of the
year. The King, being disappointed, sailed to the place where the
shattered ships lay, and the marriage was consummated; and the King and
Queen remained at Copenhagen, and did not arrive at Edinburgh until the
first of May, 1590. The storm was, after their return, considered to be
the result of some supernatural interference.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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