A Discourse on the Damned Art of Witchcraft

William Perkins (1558-1602) was a Reformed minister and theologian, and a foremost leader of the Puritan movement in the Church of England. Working from the text of Exodus 22:18, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live,” Perkins delivers one of the most penetrating discourses on the subject of the devil, witchcraft and the occult in its various forms. He shows that witchcraft was a common sin in his own day, and it is, no doubt, a common sin in our day. He demonstrates the ways that Satan uses witchcraft in its various forms, and how people of all kinds can be involved in the occult, either by entering into a covenant with Satan willfully, or unintentionally, through superstition. He covers four main points: 1) What witchcraft is, 2) What is the ground of the practice of witchcraft, 3) How many kinds and differences there are of witchcraft, and, 4) Its punishment. This is a newly typeset and modern work, not a scan or a facsimile, with an active table of contents for electronic versions.