The witchcraft persecutions mirrored the agony of the era of religious war, financial decay, and emergencies of political and scholarly power. Witchcraft trials declined when the masses began to think logically and questioned their past motives on how could judges or jurors be positive that someone was a witch. Times changed when doctors, legal counselors, judges, and even ministry came to speculate that allegations depended on superstition and terror. In the 1640s, French courts requested the capture of witch-seekers and discharged presumed witches. In 1682, a French imperial pronouncement regarded witchcraft as extortion and imposture, implying that the law did not identify anybody as a witch. Attitudes did not change for the better; what
