THE DECLINE OF WITCH BELIEFS AND TRIALS

I. Judicial, procedural changes
            as most immediate cause of decline of trials

  Spanish Inquisition, 1610: FRA ALONSO SALAZAR
                  report to Suprema on Logrono

  Roman Inquisition, 1620: Instructions on Witch Trials

  France: 1620 University of Paris bans demonic testimony        
                  (demon speaking through possessed person)
            1624  Parlement of Paris
                    requires appeal in w/c cases

  Germany, 1631: 
          Frederick  Spee, Cautio Criminalis  (K&P)
              controversial, published anonymously

  New England, 1703:
        Massachusetts bans spectral evidence

II. Intellectual changes: due to 17th C. Scientific Revolution
                                               & 18th C. Enlightenment
             occur AFTER the decline of trials has begun

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IMPACT OF SCIENTIFIC REVOLUTION ON W/C THEORY        

I. Copernican Revolution
           end of Ptolemaic, geocentric universe)

      Nicholas Copernicus 1543 published
            On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres

      1633 Galileo tried for heresy by Roman Inquisition
           charge is "Copernicanism"

II. The New Philosophy:  Mechanical World View
      "Disenchantment of universe"
              by experimental & mathematical method

      FRANCIS BACON (1626)
            Empiricism, induction, sense experience

      RENE DESCARTES (1650)
            Cartesian dualism: separation of matter and spirit
                                only link = human pineal gland
            Result: spirits cannot act on material world

      ISAAC NEWTON: PRINCIPIA MATHEMATICA, 1687
              Natural law (mathematical)
             Three laws of motion (earthly and celestial bodies)
             God = "clockmaker"; no miracles, no intervention