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mankind.
When Illumination or Illuminé-ism, in company with magic and mysticism, and a resolve to regenerate
society according to extreme free thought, inspired the Templars to the hope that they would master the
Church and the world, the equality of Woman, derived from the Cairene traditions, again received attention.
And it may be observed that during the Middle Ages, and even so late as the intense excitements which
inspired the French Huguenots, the Jansenists and the Anabaptists, Woman always came forth more
prominently or played a far greater part than she had done in social or political life. This was also the case in
the Spiritualism founded by the Fox sisters of Rochester, New York, and it is manifesting itself in many ways
in the Fin de Siècle, which is also a nervous chaos according to Nordau ,-Woman be ing evidently a fish who
shows herself most when the waters are troubled:-
"Oh, Woman, in our hours of ease!"
The reader will remember the rest. but we should also remember that in the earlier ages the vast majority of
mankind itself, suppressed by the too great or greatly abused power of Church and State, only manifested
itself at such periods of rebellion against forms or ideas grown old. And with every new rebellion, every fresh
outburst or debâcle or wild inundation and bursting over the barriers, humanity and woman gain something,
Comments on the Foregoing Texts 53
ARADIA, or the Gospel of the Witches
that is to say, their just dues or rights. For as every freshet spreads more widely its waters over the fields,
which are in due time the more fertilised thereby, so the world at large gains by every Revolution, however
terrible or repugnant it may be for a time.
The Emancipated or Woman's Rights woman, when too enthusiastic, generally considers man as limited,
while Woman is destined to gain on him. In earlier ages a contrary opinion prevailed, and both are, or were,
apparently in the wrong, so far as the future is concerned. For in truth both sexes are progressive, and
progress in this respect means not a conflict of the male and female principle, such as formed the basis of the
Mahabarata, but a gradual ascertaining of true ability and adjust ment of relations or co-ordination of
powers-in doing which on a scientific basis all conflict ceases.
These remarks are appropriate to my text and subject, because it is in studying the epochs when woman has
made herself prominent and influential that we learn what the capacities of the fe male sex truly are. Among
these, that of Witchcraft as it truly was-not as it is generally quite misunderstood-is as deeply interesting as
any other. For the Witch-laying aside all question as to magic or its non- existence -was once a real factor or
great power in rebellious social life, and to this very day-as most novels bear witness-it is recognised that
there is something uncanny, mysteri ous, and incomprehensible in woman, which neither she herself nor man
can explain.
"For every woman is at heart a witch."
We have banished the broom and the cat and the working miracles, the Sabbat and pacts with Satan, but the
mystery or puzzle is as great as ever; no one living knows to what it is destined to lead. Are not the charms of
love of every kind, and the enjoyment of beauty in all its forms in nature, mysteries, miracles, or magical?
To all who are interested in this subject of woman's influence and capacity, this Evangel of the Witches will
be of value as showing that there have been strange thinkers who regarded creation as a feminine
development or parthenogenesis from which the masculine principle was born. Lucifer, or Light, lay hidden
in the darkness of Diana, as heat is hidden in lee. But the regenerator or Messiah of this strange doctrine is a
woman Aradia, though the two, mother and daughter, are confused or reflected in the different tales, even as
Jahveh is confused with the Elohim.
"Remains to be said"-that the Adam-nable and Eve-il, or Adamite assemblages enjoined in the Gospel of
Sorcery, are not much, if at all, kept up by the now few and far between old or young witches and venerable
wizards of the present day. That is to say, not to my knowledge in Central or Northern Italy. But among the
roués, viveurs, and fast women of Florence and Milan-where they are not quite as rare as eclipses-such
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