Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather: A Reply

Mather remarks, in connection with his synopsis of these Rules: "They are considerable things, which I have thus related." Those I have particularly noticed were enough to let in a large part of the evidence given at the Salem trials—in many respects, the most effective and formidable part—striking the Jury and Court, as well as the people, with an "awe," which rendered no other evidence necessary to overwhelm the mind and secure conviction. The Prisoners themselves were amazed and astounded by it. Mr. Hale, in his account of the proceedings, says: "When George Burroughs was tried, seven or eight of the confessors, severally called, said, they knew the said Burroughs; and saw him at a Witch-meeting at the Village; and heard him exhort the company to pull down the Kingdom of God and set up the Kingdom of the Devil. He denied all, yet said he justified the Judges and Jury in condemning him; because there were so many positive witnesses against him; but said he died by false witnesses." Mr. Hale proceeds to mention this fact: "I seriously spake to one that witnessed (of his exhorting at the Witch-meeting at the Village) saying to her; 'You are one that bring this man to death: if you have charged any thing upon him that is not true, recall it before it be too late, while he is alive.' She answered me, she had nothing to charge herself with, upon that account."

Mather omits this circumstance in copying Mr. Hale's narrative. It has always been a mystery, what led the "accusing girls" to cry out, as they afterwards did, against Mr. Hale's wife. Perhaps this expostulation with one of their witnesses, awakened their suspicions. They always struck at every one who appeared to be wavering, or in the least disposed to question the correctness of what was going on. The statement of Mr. Hale shows how effectual and destructive the evidence, authorized by Bernard's book, was; and it also proves how unjust, to the Judges and Magistrates, is the charge made upon them by the Reviewer, that they disregarded and violated the advice of the Ministers. In admitting a species of evidence, wholly spectral, which was fatal, more than any other, to the Prisoners, they followed a rule laid down by the very authors whose "directions" the Ministers, in their Advice, written by "Mr. Mather the younger," enjoined upon them to follow. It is noticeable, by the way, that, in that document, they left Gaule out of the "triumvirate;" Mather finding nothing in his book to justify the admission of spectral testimony.

He urges the force of the evidence, from confessions, with all possible earnestness.

"One would think all the rules of understanding human affairs are at an end, if after so many most voluntary harmonious confessions, made by intelligent persons, of all ages, in sundry towns, at several times, we must not believe the main strokes, wherein those confessions all agree."—Page 8.

He continues to press the point thus: "If the Devils now can strike the minds of men with any poisons of so fine a composition and operation, that scores of innocent people shall unite, in confessions of a crime, which we see actually committed, it is a thing prodigious, beyond the wonders of the former ages; and it threatens no less than a sort of a dissolution upon the world. Now, by these confessions, it is agreed, that the Devil has made a dreadful knot of witches in the country, and by the help of witches has dreadfully increased that knot; that these witches have driven a trade of commissioning their confederate spirits, to do all sorts of mischiefs to the neighbors, whereupon there have ensued such mischievous consequences upon the bodies and estates of the neighborhood, as could not otherwise be accounted for; yea, that at prodigious Witch-meetings the wretches have proceeded so far as to concert and consult the methods of rooting out the Christian religion from this country, and setting up, instead of it, perhaps a more gross Diabolism, than ever the world saw before. And yet it will be a thing little short of miracle, if, in so spread a business as this, the Devil should not get in some of his juggles, to confound the discovery of all the rest."

In the last sentence of the foregoing passage, we see an idea, which Mather expressed in several instances. It amounts to this. Suppose the Devil does "sometimes" make use of the spectre of an innocent person—he does it for the purpose of destroying our faith in that kind of evidence, and leading us to throw it all out, thereby "confounding the discovery" of those cases in which, as ordinarily, he makes use of the spectres of his guilty confederates, and, in effect, sheltering "all the rest," that is, the whole body of those who are the willing and covenanted subjects of his diabolical kingdom, from detection. He says: "The witches have not only intimated, but some of them acknowledged, that they have plotted the representations of innocent persons to cover and shelter themselves in their witchcrafts."

He further suggests—for no other purpose, it would seem, than to reconcile us to the use of such evidence, even though, it may, in "rare and extraordinary" instances, bear against innocent persons, scarcely, however, to be apprehended, "when matters come before civil judicature"—that it may be the divine will, that, occasionally, an innocent person may be cut off: "Who of us can exactly state how far our God may, for our chastisement, permit the Devil to proceed in such an abuse?" He then alludes to the meeting of Ministers, under his father's auspices, at Cambridge, on the first of August; quotes with approval, the result of his "Discourse," then held; and immediately proceeds: "It is rare and extraordinary, for an honest Naboth to have his life itself sworn away by two children of Belial, and yet no infringement hereby made on the Rectoral Righteousness of our eternal Sovereign, whose judgments are a great deep, and who gives none account of his matters."—Page 9.

The amount of all this is, that it is so rare and extraordinary for the Devil to assume the spectral shape of an innocent person, that it is best, "when," as his expression is, in another place, "the public safety makes an exigency," to receive and act upon such evidence, even if it should lead to the conviction of an innocent person—a thing so seldom liable to occur, and, indeed, barely possible. The procedure would be but carrying out the divine "permission," and a fulfilment of "the Rectoral Righteousness" of Him, whose councils are a great deep, not to be accounted for to, or by, us.

In summing up what the witches had been doing at Salem Village, during the preceding Summer, Mather says: "The Devil, exhibiting himself ordinarily as a small black man, has decoyed a fearful knot of proud, froward, ignorant, envious and malicious creatures to list themselves in his horrid service by entering their names in a book, by him tendered unto them." "That they, each of them, have, their spectres or Devils, commissioned by them, and representing them, to be the engines of their malice." He enumerates, as facts, all the statements of the "afflicted" witnesses and confessing witches, as to the horrible and monstrous things perpetrated by the spectres of the accused parties; and he applauds the Court, testifying to the successful and beneficial issue of its proceedings. "Our honorable Judges have used, as Judges have heretofore done, the spectral evidence, to introduce their further enquiries into the lives of the persons accused; and they have, thereupon, by the wonderful Providence of God, been so strengthened with other evidences, that some of the Witch-gang have been fairly executed."—Pages 41, 43.

The language of Cotton Mather, as applied to those who had suffered, as witches, "a fearful knot of proud, froward, ignorant, envious and malicious creatures—a Witch-gang,"—is rather hard, as coming from a Minister who, as the Reviewer asserts, had officiated in their death scenes, witnessed their devout and Christian expressions and deportment, and been their comforter, consoler, counsellor and friend.

The dissatisfaction that pervaded the public mind, about the time of the last executions at Salem, which Phips describes, was so serious, that both the Mathers were called in to allay it. The father also, at the request of the Ministers, wrote a book, entitled, Cases of Conscience, concerning Evil Spirits, personating men, Witchcrafts, &c., the general drift of which is against spectral evidence. He says: "Spectres are Devils, in the shape of persons, either living or dead." Speaking of bewitched persons, he says: "What they affirm, concerning others, is not to be taken for evidence. Whence had they this supernatural sight? It must needs be either from Heaven or from Hell. If from Heaven (as Elisha's servant and Balaam's ass could discern Angels) let their testimony be received. But if they had this knowledge from Hell, though there may possibly be truth in what they affirm, they are not legal witnesses: for the Law of God allows of no revelation from any other Spirit but himself. Isa., viii., 19. It is a sin against God, to make use of the Devil's help to know that which cannot be otherwise known; and I testify against it, as a great transgression, which may justly provoke the Holy One of Israel, to let loose Devils on the whole land. Luke, iv., 38."

After referring to a couple of writers on the subject, the very next sentence is this: "Although the Devil's accusations may be so far regarded as to cause an enquiry into the truth of things, Job, i., 11, 12, and ii., 5, 6; yet not so as to be an evidence or ground of conviction."

It appears therefore, that Increase Mather, while writing with much force and apparent vehemence against spectral evidence, still in reality countenanced its introduction, as a basis of "enquiry into the truth of things," preliminary to other evidence. This was, after all, to use the form of thought of these writers, letting the Devil into the case; and that was enough, from the nature of things, in the then state of wild superstition and the blind delusions of the popular mind, to give to spectral evidence the controlling sway it had in the Salem trials, and would necessarily have, every where, when introduced at all.

In a Postscript to Cases of Conscience, Increase Mather says that he hears that "some have taken up a notion," that there was something contradictory between his views and those of his son, set forth in the Wonders of the Invisible World. "Tis strange that such imaginations should enter into the minds of men." He goes on to say he had read and approved of his son's book, before it was printed; and falls back, as both of them always did, when pressed, upon the Advice of the Ministers, of the fifteenth of June, in which, he says, they concurred.

There can be no manner of doubt that the "strange" opinion did prevail, at the time, and has ever since, that the father and son did entertain very different sentiments about the Salem proceedings. The precise form of that difference is not easily ascertained. The feelings, so natural and proper, on both sides, belonging to the relation they sustained to each other, led them to preserve an appearance of harmony, especially in whatever was committed to the press. Then, again, the views they each entertained were in themselves so inconsistent, that it was not difficult to persuade themselves that they were substantially similar. There was much in the father, for the son to revere: there was much in the son, for the father to admire. Besides, the habitual style in which they and the Ministers of that day indulged, of saying and unsaying, on the same page—putting a proposition and then linking to it a countervailing one—covered their tracks to each other and to themselves. This is their apology; and none of them needs it more than Cotton Mather. He was singularly blind to logical sequence. With wonderful power over language, he often seems not to appreciate the import of what he is saying; and to this defect, it is agreeable to think, much, if not all, that has the aspect of a want of fairness and even truthfulness, in his writings may be attributed.

As associate Ministers of the same congregation, it was desirable for the Mathers to avoid being drawn into a conflicting attitude, on any matter of importance. Drake, however, in his History of Boston, (p. 545) says that there was supposed, at the formation of the New North Church, in that place, in 1712, to have been a jealousy between them. There were, indeed, many points of dissimilarity, as well as of similarity, in their culture, experience, manners, and ways; and men conversant with them, at the time, may have noticed a difference in their judgments and expressions, relating to the witchcraft affair, of which no knowledge has come to us, except the fact, that it was so understood at the time.

Cotton Mather brought all his ability to bear in preparing the Wonders of the Invisible World. It is marked throughout by his peculiar genius, and constructed with great ingenuity and elaboration; but it was "water spilt on the ground." So far as the end, for which it was designed, is regarded, it died before it saw the light.

XIII

THE COURT OF OYER AND TERMINER BROUGHT TO A SUDDEN END. SIR WILLIAM PHIPS

When Sir William Phips went to the eastward, it was expected that his absence would be prolonged to the twelfth of October. We cannot tell exactly when he returned; probably some days before the twelfth. Writing on the fourteenth, he says, that before any application was made to him for the purpose, he had put a stop to the proceedings of the Court. He probably signified, informally, to the Judges, that they must not meet on the day to which they had adjourned. Brattle, writing on the eighth, had not heard any thing of the kind. But the Rev. Samuel Torrey of Weymouth, who was in full sympathy with the prosecutors, had heard of it on the seventh, as appears by this entry in Sewall's Diary: "Oct. 7th, 1692. Mr. Torrey seems to be of opinion, that the Court of Oyer and Terminer should go on, regulating any thing that may have been amiss, when certainly found to be so."

Sewall and Stoughton were among the principal friends of Torrey; and he, probably, had learned from them, Phips's avowed purpose to stop the proceedings of the Court, in the witchcraft matter. The Court, however, was allowed to sit, in other cases, as it held a trial in Boston, on the tenth, in a capital case of the ordinary kind. The purpose of the Governor gradually became known. Danforth, in a conversation with Sewall, at Cambridge, on the fifteenth, expressed the opinion that the witchcraft trials ought not to proceed any further.

It is not unlikely that Phips, while at the eastward, had received some communication that hastened his return. He describes the condition of things, as he found it. We know that the lives of twenty people had been taken away, one of them a Minister of the Gospel. Two Ministers had been accused, one of them the Pastor of the Old South Church; the name of the other is not known. A hundred were in prison; about two hundred more were under accusation, including some men of great estates in Boston, the mother-in-law of one of the Judges, Corwin, and a member of the family of Increase Mather, although, as he says, in no way related to him. A Magistrate, who was a member of the House of Assembly, had fled for his life; and Phips's trusted naval commander, a man of high standing in the Church and in society, as well as in the service, after having been committed to Jail, had escaped to parts unknown. More than all, the Governor's wife had been cried out upon. We can easily imagine his state of mind. Sir William Phips was noted for the sudden violence of his temper. Mather says that he sometimes "showed choler enough." Hutchinson says that "he was of a benevolent, friendly disposition; at the same time quick and passionate;" and, in illustration of the latter qualities, he relates that he got into a fisticuff fight with the Collector of the Port, on the wharf, handling him severely; and that, having high words, in the street, with a Captain of the Royal Navy, "the Governor made use of his cane and broke Short's head." When his Lady told her story to him, and pictured the whole scene of the "strange ferment" in the domestic and social circles of Boston and throughout the country, it was well for the Chief-justice, the Judges, and perhaps his own Ministers, that they were not within the reach of those "blows," with which, as Mather informs us, in the Life of Phips, the rough sailor was wont, when the gusts of passion were prevailing, to "chastise incivilities," without reference to time or place, rank or station.

But, as was his wont, the storm of wrath soon subsided; his purpose, however, under the circumstances, as brave as it was wise and just, was, as the result showed, unalterable. He communicated to the Judges, personally, that they must sit no more, at Salem or elsewhere, to try cases of witchcraft; and that no more arrests must be made, on that charge.

Mather's book, all ready as it was for the press, thus became labor thrown away. It was not only rendered useless for the purpose designed, but a most serious difficulty obstructed its publication. Phips forbade the "printing of any discourses, one way or another;" and the Wonders had incorporated in it some Sermons, impregnated, through and through, with combustible matter, in Phips's view, likely to kindle an inextinguishable flame.

All that could be done was to keep still, in the hope that he would become more malleable. In the meanwhile, public business called him away, perhaps to Rhode Island or Connecticut, from the eighteenth to the twenty-seventh of October. In his absence, whether in consequence of movements he had put in train, or solely from what had become known of his views, the circumstance occurred which is thus related in Sewall's Diary—the Legislature was then in Session: "Oct. 26, 1692. A Bill is sent in about calling a Fast and Convocation of Ministers, that may be led in the right way, as to the Witchcrafts. The season, and manner of doing it, is such, that the Court of Oyer and Terminer count themselves thereby dismissed. 29 nos & 33 yeas to the Bill. Capt. Bradstreet, and Lieut. True, Wm. Hutchins, and several other interested persons, in the affirmative."

The course of Nathaniel Saltonstall, of Haverhill, and the action in the Legislature of the persons here named, entitle the Merrimac towns of Essex-county to the credit of having made the first public and effectual resistance to the fanaticism and persecutions of 1692.

The passage of this Bill, in the House of Representatives, shows how the public mind had been changed, since the June Session. Dudley Bradstreet was a Magistrate and member from Andover, son of the old Governor, and, with his wife, had found safety from prosecution by flight; Henry True, a member from Salisbury, was son-in-law of Mary Bradbury, who had been condemned to death; Samuel Hutchins, (inadvertently called "Wm.," by Sewall) was a member from Haverhill, and connected by marriage with a family, three of whom were tried for their lives. Sewall says there were "several other" members of the House, interested in like manner. This shows into what high circles the accusers had struck.

It appears, by the same Diary, that on the twenty-seventh, Cotton Mather preached the Thursday Lecture, from James, i., 4. The day of trial was then upon him and his fellow-actors; and patience was inculcated as the duty of the hour.

The Diary relates that at a meeting of the Council, on the twenty-eighth, in the afternoon, Sewall, "desired to have the advice of the Governor and Council, as to the sitting of the Court of Oyer and Terminer, next week; said, should move it no more; great silence prevailed, as if should say, Do not go."

The entry does not state whether Phips was present; as, however, the time fixed for his recent brief absence had expired, probably he was in his seat. The following mishap, described by Sewall, as occurring that day, perhaps detained the Deputy-governor: "Oct. 28. Lt. Govr, coming over the causey, is, by reason of the high tide, so wet, that is fain to go to bed, till sends for dry clothes to Dorchester."

The "great silence" was significant of the embarrassment in which they were placed, and their awe of the "choler" of the Governor.

The Diary gives the following account of the Session the next day, at which, (as Sewall informs us,) the Lieutenant-governor was not present: "Oct. 29. Mr. Russel asked, whether the Court of Oyer and Terminer should sit, expressing some fear of inconvenience by its fall. Governor said, it must fall."

Thus died the Court of Oyer and Terminer. Its friends cherished, to the last, the hope that Sir William might be placated, and possibly again brought under control; but it vanished, when the emphatic and resolute words, reported by Sewall, were uttered.

The firmness and force of character of the Governor are worthy of all praise. Indeed, the illiterate and impulsive sailor has placed himself, in history, far in front of all the honored Judges and learned Divines, of his day. Not one of them penetrated the whole matter as he did, when his attention was fully turned to it, and his feelings enlisted, to decide, courageously and righteously, the question before him. He saw that no life was safe while the evidence of the "afflicted persons" was received, "either to the committing or trying" of any persons. He thus broke through the meshes which had bound Judges and Ministers, the writers of books and the makers of laws; and swept the whole fabric of "spectral testimony" away, whether as matter of "enquiry" and "presumption," or of "conviction." The ship-carpenter of the Kennebec laid the axe to the root of the tree.

The following extract from a letter of Sir William Phips, just put into my hands, and for which I am indebted to Mr. Goodell, substantiates the conclusions to which I have been led.

"Governor Phips to the Lords of the Committee of Trade and Plantations, 3 April, 1693.

"May it please your Lordships:

"I have intreated Mr Blathwayte to lay before your Lordships several letters, wherein I have given a particular account of my stopping a supposed witchcraft, which had proved fatall to many of their Majties good subjects, had there not been a speedy end putt thereto; for a stop putt to the proceedings against such as were accused, hath caused the thing itself to cease."

This shows that, addressing officially his Home Government, he assumed the responsibility of having "stopped and put a speedy end to the proceedings;" that he had no great faith in the doctrines then received touching the reality of witchcraft; and that he was fully convinced that, if he had allowed the trials to go on, and the inflammation of the public mind to be kept up by "discourses," the bloody tragedy would have been prolonged, and "proved fatal to many good" people.

There are two men—neither of them belonging to the class of scholars or Divines; both of them guided by common sense, good feeling, and a courageous and resolute spirit—who stand alone, in the scenes of the witchcraft delusions. Nathaniel Saltonstall, who left the Council and the Court, the day the Ministers' Advice, to go on with the prosecutions, was received, and never appeared again until that Advice was abandoned and repudiated; and Sir William Phips, who stamped it out beneath his feet.

But how with Cotton Mather's Book, the Wonders of the Invisible World? On the eleventh of October, Stoughton and Sewall signed a paper, printed in the book, [p. 88] endorsing its contents, especially as to "matters of fact and evidence" and the "methods of conviction used in the proceedings of the Court at Salem." The certificate repeats the form of words, so often used in connection with the book, that it was written "at the direction of His Excellency the Governor," without, as in all cases, specifying who, whether Phips or Stoughton, was the Governor referred to. As all the Judges were near at hand, and as the certificate related to the proceedings before them, it is quite observable that only the two mentioned signed it. As they were present, in the private conference, with Cotton Mather, at the house of one of them, on the twenty-second of September, when its preparation for publication was finally arranged, they could not well avoid signing it. The times were critical; and the rest of the Judges, knowing the Governor's feelings, thought best not to appear. Of the three other persons, at that conference, Hathorne, it is true, was a Judge of that Court, but it is doubtful whether he often, or ever, took his seat as such; besides, he was too experienced and cautious a public man, unnecessarily to put his hand to such a paper, when it was known, as it was probably to him, that Sir William Phips had forbidden publications of the kind.