1 August 1628

Will this never end?  Good God, give me grace to bear and overcome this.  I have received a letter from my father, Lord have mercy on him!  He says that he is innocent, but through the most horrible tortures he was brought to confess to crimes beyond my worst imaginings.  Even, Dr. Braun, our kinsman, believed my father a witch (Apps and Gow 159).  My poor, dear, good father!  His hand shook so while he wrote that some passages I could barely make out.  He says that he is only just able to use his hands again after the tortures they put him though (Apps and Gow, 164). 

The crimes of men deserve their just punishment, yet the evil in Bamberg is not that of witches but of jurors and judges who viciously and falsely prosecute them!  All law is broken, both the laws of man and the laws of God, for in defiance of all these they refused my father the right to examine the witnesses against him under oath, and they refused him a priest’s counsel (Apps and Gow, 160).  Yet God did not abandon him, for in devoting his pain to the five wounds of our blessed Saviour my father withstood the temptation to confess through great torments (Apps and Gow, 161).  I felt such pride when I read of his fortitude, yet even he could not bear the agony forever—for they let no one go, he said, “even if he withstands all tortures” (Apps and Gow, 161).  He wrote of the great moral anguish this realization caused him, for it left him with no choice but to confess to having renounced God, yet as ever his strength of faith rescued him from the worst errors.  He chose to confess to the crimes of witchcraft, but he would confess this perjury to the priest granted him before his death, and go to our Lord with a clean spirit.  Oh what a world it is, where the wicked force the pious to lie against their souls!

Now that my eyes are opened to how it is, I must believe that it has all been in error.  My poor mother, forgive me for ever doubting you.  I have been a daughter undeserving of you.  My poor father!  All those I knew—how many were true witches?  Of some I could believe it at the time, but perhaps they were all innocent?  If not all, then many more than were justly put to death. 

God has left Bamberg to the Devil as a punishment for our sins.  Those charged with protecting us destroy us.  That seems clear now.  Good Christians perish in flame, and the wolves of the judiciary howl at our windows.  We are under siege.  My father has bade me leave Bamberg for a time, and make a pilgrimage (Apps and Gow, 164), but I am unsure.  I will ask my cousin what he thinks I ought to do.