Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather Part 6

As only a few days over four months elapsed between Proctor's being put into the Boston Jail and his execution, deducting the "several months"

he spent there, but little time remained, after his transfer to the Salem Jail, for Mather's "journeys to Salem," for the purpose of administering spiritual consolation to him. So far as making his "acquaintance," while in Boston Jail is regarded, upon the same ground it might be affirmed that he was the spiritual adviser of the Prisoners generally; for most of those, who suffered, were in Boston Jail as long as Proctor; and he visited them all alike.

The Reviewer adduces not a particle of evidence to prove his absolute statement, nor even to countenance the idea; but, as is his custom, he transforms a conjecture into an established fact. On a bare surmise, he builds an argument, and treats the whole, basis and superstructure, as History. To show, more particularly, how he thus _makes History_, I must follow this matter up a little further. Brattle, in his _Account of the Witchcraft in the County of Ess.e.x, 1692_, has this paragraph, after stating that the persons executed "went out of the world, not only with as great protestations, but also with as great shows, of innocency, as men could do:" "They protested their innocency as in the presence of the great G.o.d, whom forthwith they were to appear before: they wished, and declared their wish, that their blood might be the last innocent blood shed upon that account. With great affection, they entreated Mr. C. M.

to pray with them: they prayed that G.o.d would discover what witchcrafts were among us: they forgave their accusers: they spake without reflection on Jury and Judges, for bringing them in guilty and condemning them: [they prayed earnestly for pardon for all _other_ sins, and for an interest in the precious blood of our dear Redeemer:] and seemed to be very sincere, upright, and sensible of their circ.u.mstances on all accounts; especially Proctor and Willard, whose whole management of themselves, from the Jail to the Gallows, [and whilst at the Gallows,] was very affecting and melting to the hearts of some considerable spectators, whom I could mention to you:--[but they are executed and so I leave them.]"--_Ma.s.sachusetts Historical Collections_, I., v., 68.

The Reviewer cites this paragraph, omitting the clauses I have placed within brackets, _without any indication of the omissions_. The first of the omitted clauses is a dying declaration of the innocence of the sufferers, as to the crime alleged. The second proves that they "managed themselves" after, as well as before, reaching the Gallows, and to their dying moment--seeming to preclude the idea that their exercises of prayer and preparation were directed or guided by any spiritual adviser.

The last is an emphatic and natural expression of Brattle's feelings and judgment on the occasion.

The Reviewer follows his citation, thus: "Mr. Brattle mentions no other person than Mr. C. M. as the comforter and friend of the sufferers, especially Proctor and Willard." "In the above statement we trace the character of their spiritual counsellor." "We now see the object of Mr.

Mather's visits to Salem." "Would these persons have asked Mr. Mather to be their spiritual comforter, if he had been the agent, as has been alleged, of bringing them into their sad condition?"

In other forms of language and other connections, he speaks of Mr.

Mather's presence, at these executions, as "the performance of a sad duty to Proctor and Willard," and represents Brattle as calling him "the spiritual adviser of the persons condemned." All this he a.s.serts as proved and admitted fact; and the whole rests upon the foregoing _mutilated_ paragraph of Brattle.

Let the reader thoroughly examine and consider that paragraph, and then judge of this Reviewer's claim to establish History. The word "affection," was used much at that time to signify _earnest desire_.

"They"--that is, the persons then about to die, namely, the Rev. George Burroughs, an humble, laborious, devoted Minister of the Gospel; John Proctor, the owner of valuable farms and head of a large family; John Willard, a young married man of most respectable connections; George Jacobs, an early settler, land-holder, and a grandfather, of great age, with flowing white locks, sustained, as he walked, by two staffs or crutches; and Martha Carrier, the wife of a farmer in Andover, with a family of children, some of them quite young--"entreated Mr. C. M. to pray with them." Why did they have to "entreat" him, if he had come all the way from Boston for that purpose? They all had Ministers near at hand--Carrier had two Ministers, either or both of whom would have been prompt to come, if persons suffering for the imputed crime of witchcraft had been allowed to have the attendance of "spiritual comforters," at their executions. If Mather had prayed with them, Brattle would have said so. His language is equivalent to a statement, that "Mr. C. M." was reluctant, if he did not absolutely refuse to do it; and the only legitimate inferences from the whole pa.s.sage are, that the sufferers did their own praying,--from Brattle's account of their dying prayers, they did it well--and that without "spiritual comforter," "adviser," or "friend," in the last dread hour, they were left to the "management of themselves."

When the paragraph is taken in connection with the relations of Brattle to Mather, not approving of his course in public affairs, but, at the same time, delicately situated, being a.s.sociated with him in important public interests and leading circles, the conclusion seems probable that he meant, in an indirect mode of expression, to notice the fact that Mather refused to pray with the sufferers on the occasion. In fact, we know that Nicholas Noyes, who was Proctor's Minister, refused to pray with him, unless he would confess. Mather and Noyes were intimately united by personal and professional ties of friends.h.i.+p and communion, and probably would not run counter to each other, at such a time, and in the presence of such a mult.i.tude of Ministers and people.

It is to be regarded exclusively as ill.u.s.trating the shocking character of the whole procedure of the witchcraft prosecutions, and not as a personally harsh or cruel thing, that Noyes or Mather was unwilling to pray with persons, at their public executions, who stood convicted of being confederates of the Devil, and who, refusing to confess, retained that character to the last. Ministers, like them, believing that the convicts were malefactors of a far different and deeper dye than ordinary human crime could impart, rebels against G.o.d, apostates from Christ, sons of Belial, recruits of the Devil's army, sworn in allegiance to his Kingdom, baptized into his church, beyond the reach of hope and prayer, could hardly be expected to pray _with_ them. To _join_ them in prayer was impossible. To go through the forms of united prayer would have been incongruous with the occasion, and not more inconsistent with the convictions of the Ministers, than repugnant to the conscious innocence and natural sensibilities of the sufferers. Condemned, unconfessing, unrepentant witches might be prayed _for_, or _at_, but not _with_.

The superior greatness of mind of Burroughs and his fellow sufferers, the true spirit of Christian forgiveness elevating them above a sense of the errors and wrongs of which they were the victims, are beautifully and gloriously shown in their earnestly wis.h.i.+ng and entreating Noyes and Mather to pray with them. They pitied their delusion, and were desirous, in that last hour, to regard them and all others as their brethren, and bow with them before the Father of all. The request they made of Christian Ministers, who, at the moment, regarded them as in league with the Devil, might not be exactly logical; a failure to comply with it is not a just matter of reproach; but the fact that it was repeated with earnestness, "entreated with affection," shows that the last pulsations of their hearts were quickened by a holy and heavenly Love.

The Reviewer asks: "Were those five persons executed that day without any spiritual adviser?" There is no evidence, I think, to show that a Minister ever accompanied, in that character, persons convicted of witchcraft, at the place of execution. All that can be gathered from Brattle's account is, that, on the occasion to which he is referring, the sufferers _themselves_ offered public prayers. We know that Martha Corey, at a subsequent execution, p.r.o.nounced a prayer that made a deep impression on the a.s.sembled mult.i.tude. Mr. Burroughs's prayer is particularly spoken of. So, also, in England, when the Reverend Mr.

Lewis, an Episcopal clergyman, eighty years of age, and who, for fifty years, had been Vicar of Brandeston, in the County of Suffolk, was executed for alleged witchcraft, the venerable man read his own funeral service, according to the forms of his Church, "committing his own body to the ground, in sure and certain hope of the resurrection to eternal life."

This whole story of the spiritual relation between Mather and Proctor is a bare fiction, entirely in conflict with all tradition and all probability, without a shadow of support in any doc.u.ment adduced by the Reviewer; and yet he would have it received as an established fact, and incorporated, as such, in history. Liberties, like this, cannot be allowed.

Sewall's Diary, at the date of the nineteenth of August, 1692, has this entry: "This day George Burrough, John Willard, John Proctor, Martha Carrier, and George Jacobs were executed at Salem, a very great number of spectators being present. Mr. Cotton Mather was there, Mr. Sims, Hale, Noyes, Cheever, etc. All of them said they were innocent, Carrier and all. Mr. Mather says they all died by a righteous sentence. Mr.

Burrough, by his Speech, Prayer, protestation of his innocence, did much move unthinking persons, which occasioned the speaking hardly concerning his being executed."

It is quite remarkable that Cotton Mather should have gone directly home to Boston, after the execution, and made himself noticeable by proclaiming such a harsh sentiment against _all_ the sufferers, if he had just been performing friendly offices to them, as "spiritual adviser, counsellor, and comforter." Clergymen, called to such melancholy and affecting functions, do not usually emerge from them in the frame of mind exhibited in the language ascribed to Mather, by Sewall. It shows, at any rate, that Mather felt sure that Proctor went out of the world, an unrepenting, unconfessing wizard, and, therefore, not a fit subject for a Christian Minister to unite with in prayer.

One other remark, by the way. The account Sewall gives of the impression made by Burroughs, on the spectators, now first brought to light, in print, is singularly confirmatory of what Calef says on the subject.

My chief purpose, however, in citing this pa.s.sage from Sewall's Diary, is this. Mather was not present at the Trial of Burroughs. If he was not present at his Examination before the Magistrates, how could he have spoken, as he did, of the righteousness of his sentence? There had been no Report or publication, in any way, of the evidence; and he could only have received a competent knowledge of it from personal presence, on one or the other of those occasions. He could not have been justified in so confident and absolute a judgment, by mere hearsay. If that had been the source of his information, he would have modified his language accordingly.

There is one other item to be considered, in treating the question of Mather's connection with the Examinations of the Prisoners, before the Magistrates.

When Proctor was awaiting his trial, during the short period, previous to that event, that he was in the Salem Jail, he had addressed a letter to "Mr. Mather, Mr. Allen, Mr. Moody, Mr. Willard and Mr. Baily," all Ministers, begging them to intercede, in behalf of himself and fellow-prisoners, to secure to them better treatment, especially a fairer trial than they could have in Salem, where such a violent excitement had been wrought up against them. From the character of the letter, it is evident that it was addressed to them in the hope and belief that they were accessible, to such an appeal. But one of the Mathers is named. They were a.s.sociate Ministers of the same Church.

Although the father was President of the College at Cambridge, he resided in Boston, and was in the active exercise of his ministry there.

The question is, Which of them is meant? In my book, I expressed the opinion that it was Increase, the father. The Reviewer says it was Cotton, the son. It is a fair question; and every person can form a judgment upon it. The other persons named, comprising the rest of the Ministers then connected with the Boston Churches, are severally, more or less, indicated by what has come to us, as not having gone to extremes, in support of the witchcraft prosecutions.

Increase Mather was commonly regarded, upon whatever grounds, as not going so far as his son, in that direction. The name, "Mr. Mather,"

heads the list. From his standing, as presiding over the College and the Clergy, it was proper to give him this position. His age and seniority of settlement, also ent.i.tled him to it. Usage, and all general considerations of propriety, require us to a.s.sume that by "Mr. Mather,"

the _elder_ is meant. Cotton Mather, being the youngest of the Boston Ministers, would not be likely to be the first named, in such a list.

Besides, he was considered, as he himself complains, as the "doer of all the hard things, that were done, in the prosecution of the witchcraft."

Whoever concludes that Increase Mather was the person, in Proctor's mind, will appreciate the fact that Cotton Mather is omitted in the list. It proves that Proctor considered him beyond the reach of all appeals, in behalf of accused persons; and tends to confirm the tradition, in the family, that his course towards Proctor, when under examination, either before the Magistrates or in Court, had indicated a fixed and absolute prejudice or conviction against him. This Letter of Proctor's, printed in my book, [_ii., 310_] utterly disperses the visionary fabric of the Reviewer's fancy, that Cotton Mather was his "spiritual adviser," counselling him in frequent visits to the Salem Jail. It denounces, in unreserved language, "the Magistrates, Ministers, Juries," as under the "delusion of the Devil, which we can term no other, by reason we know, in our own consciences, we are all innocent persons;" and is couched in a bold, outspoken and trenchant style, that would have shocked and incensed Cotton Mather to the highest possible degree. It is absolutely certain, that if Cotton Mather had been Proctor's "friend and counsellor," a more prudent and cautious tone and style would have been given to the whole doc.u.ment.

In concluding the considerations that render it probable that Cotton Mather had much to do with the Examinations, it may be said, in general, that he vindicates the course taken at them, in language that seems to identify himself with them, and to prove that he could not have been opposed to the methods used in them.

X.

COTTON MATHER AND THE WITCHCRAFT TRIALS. THE EXECUTIONS.

I now proceed to examine Cotton Mather's connection with the Trials at Salem. It is fully admitted that he did not personally attend any of them. His averment to this effect does not allow the supposition that he could have deceived himself, on such a point. In his letter to Richards, as has been seen, he expressed his great disappointment in not being well enough to accompany him to this first Session of the Special Court; and the tenor of the pa.s.sage proves that he had fully expected and designed to be present, at the trials, generally. Whether the same bodily indisposition continued to forbid his attendance at its successive adjournments, we cannot obtain information.

The first point of connection I can find between him and the trials, is brought to view in a meeting of certain Ministers, after executions had taken place, and while trials were pending.

Increase Mather, in his _Cases of Conscience_, has the following: "As for the judgment of the Elders in New England, so far as I can learn, they do generally concur with Mr. Perkins and Mr. Bernard. This I know, that, at a meeting of Ministers at Cambridge, August 1, 1692, where were present seven Elders, besides the President of the College, the question then discoursed on, was, whether the Devil may not sometimes have a permission to represent an innocent person as tormenting such as are under diabolical molestations? The answer, which they all concurred in, was in these words, viz. 'That the Devil may sometimes have a permission to represent an innocent person as tormenting such as are under diabolical molestations; but that such things are rare and extraordinary, especially when such matters come before civil judicatures'; and that some of the most eminent Ministers of the land, who were not at that meeting, are of the same judgment, I am a.s.sured.

And I am also sure that, in cases of this nature, the Priest's lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth.

_Mal._, 2, 7."

What was meant by the quotation from Malachi is left to conjecture. It looks like the notion I have supposed Cotton Mather to have, more or less, cherished, at different times--to have such cases committed to the confidential custody and management of one or more Ministers. Whether Cotton Mather, as well as his father, was at this meeting, is not stated. The expressions "rare and extraordinary" and "sometimes have a permission," and the general style of the language, are like his. At any rate, in referring to the meeting, in his _Wonders of the Invisible World_, he speaks of the Ministers present "as very pious and learned;"

says that they uttered the prevailing sense of others "eminently cautious and judicious;" and declares that they "have both argument and history to countenance them in it."

It is to be noticed, that this opinion of the Ministers, given on the first of August, if it did not authorize the admission, without reserve or limitation, of spectral evidence, in judicial proceedings, reduces the objection to it to an almost inappreciable point.

Observe the date. Already six women, heads of families, many of them of respectable positions in society, all in advanced life, one or two quite aged, and two, at least, of the most eminent Christian character, had suffered death, wholly from spectral evidence, that is, no other testimony was brought against them, as all admit, that could, even then, have convicted them. Twelve days had elapsed since five of them had been executed; in four more days, six others were to be brought to trial, among them the Rev. George Burroughs; and the Ministers pa.s.s a vote, under the lead of Increase Mather, and with the express approval of Cotton Mather, that there is very little danger of innocent people suffering, in judicial proceedings, from spectral evidence.

Let us hear no more that the Clergy of New England accepted the doctrines of those writers who had "declared against the admission of spectral testimony;" that "the Magistrates rejected those doctrines;"

that "all the evils at Salem, grew out of the position taken by the Magistrates;" and that "it had been well with the twenty victims at Salem, if the Ministers of the Colony, instead of the Lawyers, had determined their fate."

The Clergy of New England did, indeed, entertain great regard for the authority of certain writers, who were considered as, more or less, discrediting spectral evidence. The Mathers professed to concur with them in that judgment; but the ground taken at the meeting on the first of August, as above stated, was, it must be allowed, inconsistent with it. The pa.s.sages I have given, and shall give, from the writings of Cotton Mather, will ill.u.s.trate the elaborate ingenuity he displayed in trying to reconcile a respect for the said writers with the admission of that species of evidence, to an extent they were considered as disallowing.

I am indebted to George H. Moore, LL.D., of New York city, for the following important doc.u.ment. John Foster was, at its date, a member of the Council. Hutchinson, who was his grandson, speaks of him [_History, ii., 21_] as a "merchant of Boston of the first rank," "who had a great share in the management of affairs from 1689 to 1692." In the latter year, he was raised to the Council Board, being named as such in the new Charter; and held his seat, by annual elections, to the close of his life, in 1710. He seems to have belonged to the Church of the Mathers, as the father and son each preached and printed a Sermon on the occasion of his death.

_Autograph Letter of COTTON MATHER, on Witchcraft, presented to the Literary and Historical Society, by the Honorable Chief-justice SEWELL._[3]

17^th 6^m, 1692.

"S^r:

"You would know whether I still retain my opinion about y^e horrible Witchcrafts among us, and I acknowledge that I do.

"I do still Think That when there is no further Evidence against a person but only This, That a Spectre in their shape does afflict a neighbour, that Evidence is not enough to convict y^e * * * of Witchcraft.

"That the Divels have a natural power w^ch makes them capable of exhibiting what shape they please I suppose n.o.body doubts, and I have no absolute promise of G.o.d that they shall not exhibit _mine_.

"It is the opinion generally of all protestant writers that y^e Divel may thus abuse y^e innocent, yea, tis y^e confession of some popish ones. And o^r Honorable Judges are so eminent for their Justice, Wisdom, & Goodness that whatever their own particular sense may bee, yett they will not proceed capitally against any, upon a principle contested with great odds on y^e other side in y^e Learned and G.o.dly world.

"_Nevertheless, a very great use is to bee made of y^e Spectral impression upon y^e sufferers. They Justly Introduce, and Determine, an Enquiry into y^e circ.u.mstances of y^e person accused; and they strengthen other presumptions._

"_When so much use is made of those Things, I believe y^e use for w^ch y^e Great G.o.d intends y^m is made._ And accordingly you see that y^e Eccellent Judges have had such an Encouraging presence of G.o.d with them, as that scarce any, if at all any, have been Tried before them, against whom G.o.d has not strangely sent in other, & more Humane & most convincing Testimonies.