To cite other authorities would be but to quote the same words. Thomas Cooper, indeed, seems to regard this ceremony as a part of the rite of admission, but to confine it to this occasion alone is manifestly incorrect, for there is continual record of its observance at frequent Sabbats by witches of many years standing. “Secondly,” he remarks, “when this acknowledgement is made, in testimoniall of this subiection, Satan offers his back-parts to be kissed of his vassall.”79 But in the dittay of the North Berwick witches, all of whom had long been notorious for their malpractices, “Item, the said Agnis Sampson confessed that the divell being then at North Barrick Kerke, attending their comming, in the habit or likenesse of a man,80 and seeing that they tarried over long, hee at their comming enjoyned them all to a pennance, which was, that they should kisse his buttockes, in sign of duety to him, which being put over the pulpit bare, every one did as he had enjoyned them.”81
One of the principal charges which was repeatedly brought against the Knights Templars during the lengthy ecclesiastical and judicial processes, 1807–1814, was that of the osculum infame given by the juniors to their preceptors. Even so prejudiced a writer as Lea cannot but admit the truth of this accusation. In this case, however, it has nothing to do with sorcery but must be connected with the homosexuality which the Order universally practised.
There are some very important details rehearsed in a Bull, 8 June, 1303, of the noble but calumniated Boniface VIII, with reference to the case of Walter Langton, Bishop of Lichfield and Coventry (1296–1322), and treasurer of Edward I, when this prelate was accused of sorcery and homage to Satan: “For some time past it has come to our ears that our Venerable Brother Walter Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield has been commonly defamed, and accused, both in the realm of England and elsewhere, of paying homage to the Devil by kissing his posterior, and that he hath had frequent colloquies with evil spirits.”82 The Bishop cleared himself of these charges with the compurgators. Bodin refers to Guillaume Edeline, who was executed in 1453 as a wizard. He was a doctor of the Sorbonne, and prior of St. Germain en Laye: “The aforesaid sire Guillaume
