The mention of the fact by Mr. Hale, already stated, that Cotton Mather's book, Memorable Providences, was used as an authority by the Judges at the Salem Trials, shows that the author of that work was regarded by Hale as, to that extent at least, responsibly connected with the prosecutions.

I pass over, for the present, the proceedings and writings of Robert Calef.

After the lapse of a few years, a feeling, which had been slowly, but steadily, rising among the people, that some general and public acknowledgment ought to be made by all who had been engaged in the proceedings of 1692, and especially by the authorities, of the wrongs committed in that dark day, became too strong to be safely disregarded. On the seventeenth of December, 1696, Stoughton, then acting as Governor, issued a Proclamation, ordaining, in his name and that of the Council and Assembly, a Public Fast, to be kept on the fourteenth of January, to implore that the anger of God might be turned away, and His hand, then stretched over the people in manifold judgments, lifted. After referring to the particular calamities they were suffering and to the many days that had been spent in solemn addresses to the throne of mercy, it expresses a fear that something was still wanting to accompany their supplications, and proceeds to refer, specially, to the witchcraft tragedy. It was on the occasion of this Fast, that Judge Sewall acted the part, in the public assembly of the old South Church, for which his name will ever be held in dear and honored memory.

The public mind was, no doubt, gratified and much relieved, but not satisfied, by this demonstration. The Proclamation did not, after all, meet its demands. Upon careful examination and deliberate reflection, it rather aggravated the prevalent feeling. Written, as was to be supposed, by Stoughton, it could not represent a reaction in which he took no part. It spoke of "mistakes on either hand," and used general forms, "wherein we have done amiss, to do so no more." It endorsed in a new utterance, the delusion, sheltering the proper agents of the mischief, by ascribing it all to "Satan and his instruments, through the awful judgment of God;" and no atonement for the injuries to the good name and estates of the sufferers, not to speak of the lives that had been cut off, was suggested. The conviction was only deepened, in all good minds, that something more ought to be done. Mr. Hale, of Beverly, met the obligation pressing upon his sense of justice and appealing to him with especial force, by writing his book, from which the following passages are extracted: "I would come yet nearer to our own times, and bewail the errors and mistakes that have been, in the year 1692—by following such traditions of our fathers, maxims of the common law, and precedents and principles, which now we may see, weighed in the balance of the sanctuary, are found too light—Such was the darkness of that day, the tortures and lamentations of the afflicted, and the power of former precedents, that we walked in the clouds and could not see our way—I would humbly propose whether it be not expedient that somewhat more should be publicly done than yet hath, for clearing the good name and reputation of some that have suffered upon this account."

The Rev. John Higginson, Senior Pastor of the First Church in Salem, then eighty-two years of age, in a recommendatory Epistle to the Reader, prefixed to Mr. Hale's book, dated the twenty-third of March, 1698, after stating that, "under the infirmities of a decrepit old age, he stirred little abroad, and was much disenabled (both in body and mind) from knowing and judging of occurrents and transactions of that time," proceeds to say that he was "more willing to accompany" Mr. Hale "to the press," because he thought his "treatise needful and useful upon divers accounts;" among others specified by him, is the following: "That whatever errors or mistakes we fell into, in the dark hour of temptation that was upon us, may be (upon more light) so discovered, acknowledged, and disowned by us, as that it may be matter of warning and caution to those that come after us, that they may not fall into the like.—1 Cor., x., 11. Felix quem faciunt aliena pericula cautum. I would also propound, and leave it as an object of consideration, to our honored Magistrates and Reverend Ministers, whether the equity of that law in Leviticus, Chap. iv., for a sin-offering for the Rulers and for the Congregation, in the case of sins of ignorance, when they come to be known, be not obliging, and for direction to us in a Gospel way." The venerable man concludes by saying that "it shall be the prayer of him who is daily waiting for his change and looking for the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ, unto eternal life," that the "blessing of Heaven may go along with this little treatise to attain the good ends thereof."

Judge Sewall, too, and the Jury that had given the verdicts at the Trials, in 1692, publicly and emphatically acknowledged that they had been led into error.

All these things afford decisive and affecting evidence of a prevalent conviction that a great wrong had been committed. The vote passed by the Church at Salem Village, on the fourteenth of February, 1703—"We are, through God's mercy to us, convinced that we were, at that dark day, under the power of those errors which then prevailed in the land." "We desire that this may be entered in our Church-book," "that so God may forgive our Sin, and may be atoned for the land; and we humbly pray that God will not leave us any more to such errors and sins"—affords striking proof that the right feeling had penetrated the whole community. On the eighth of July, of that same year, nearly the whole body of the Clergy of Essex-county addressed a Memorial to the General Court, in which they say, "There is great reason to fear that innocent persons then suffered, and that God may have a controversy with the land upon that account."

Nothing of the kind, however, was ever heard from the Ministers of Boston and the vicinity. Why did they not join their voices in this prayer, going up elsewhere, from all concerned, for the divine forgiveness? We know that most of them felt right. Samuel Willard and James Allen did; and so did William Brattle, of Cambridge. Their silence cannot, it seems to me, be accounted for, but by considering the degree to which they were embarrassed by the relation of the Mathers to the affair. One brave-hearted old man remonstrated against their failure to meet the duty of the hour, and addressed his remonstrance to the right quarter. The Rev. Michael Wigglesworth, a Fellow of Harvard College, and honored in all the Churches, wrote a letter to Increase Mather, dated July 22, 1704 [Mather Papers, 647], couched in strong and bold terms, beginning thus:

"REV. AND DEAR S^R. I am right well assured that both yourself, your son, and the rest of our brethren with you in Boston, have a deep sense upon your spirits of the awful symptoms of the Divine displeasure that we lie under at this day." After briefly enumerating the public calamities of the period, he continues: "I doubt not but you are all endeavouring to find out and discover to the people the causes of God's controversy, and how they are to be removed; to help forward this difficult and necessary work, give me leave to impart some of my serious and solemn thoughts. I fear (amongst our many other provocations) that God hath a controversy with us about what was done in the time of the Witchcraft. I fear that innocent blood hath been shed, and that many have had their hands defiled therewith." After expressing his belief that the Judges acted conscientiously, and that the persons concerned were deceived, he proceeds: "Be it then that it was done ignorantly. Paul, a Pharisee, persecuted the Church of God, shed the blood of God's Saints, and yet obtained mercy, because he did it in ignorance; but how doth he bewail it, and shame himself for it, before God and men afterwards. [1 Tim., i., 13, 16.] I think, and am verily persuaded, God expects that we do the like, in order to our obtaining his pardon: I mean by a Public and Solemn acknowledgment of it and humiliation for it; and the more particularly and personally it is done by all that have been actors, the more pleasing it will be to God, and more effectual to turn away his judgments from the Land, and to prevent his wrath from falling upon the persons and families of such as have been most concerned.

"I know this is a Noli Me tangere, but what shall we do? Must we pine away in our iniquities, rather than boldly declare the Counsel of God, who tells us, [Isa., i., 15.] 'When you make many prayers, I will not hear you, your hands are full of blood.'"

He further says that he believes that "the whole country lies under a curse to this day, and will do, till some effectual course be taken by our honored Governor and General Court to make amends and reparation" to the families of such as were condemned "for supposed witchcraft," or have "been ruined by taking away and making havoc of their estates." After continuing the argument, disposing of the excuse that the country was too impoverished to do any thing in that way, he charges his correspondent to communicate his thoughts to "the Rev. Samuel Willard and the rest of our brethren in the ministry," that action may be taken, without delay. He concludes his plain and earnest appeal and remonstrance, in those words: "I have, with a weak body and trembling hand, endeavoured to leave my testimony before I leave the world; and having left it with you (my Rev. Brethren) I hope I shall leave this life with more peace, when God seeth meet to call me hence."

He died within a year. When the tone of this letter is carefully considered, and the pressure of its forcible and bold reasoning, amounting to expostulation, is examined, it can hardly be questioned that it was addressed to the persons who most needed to be appealed to. But no effect appears to have been produced by it.

In introducing his report of the Trials, contained in the Wonders of the Invisible World, Cotton Mather, alluding to the "surviving relations" of those who had been executed, says: "The Lord comfort them." It was poor consolation he gave them in that book—holding up their parents, wives, and husbands, as "Malefactors." Neither he nor his father ever expressed a sentiment in harmony with those uttered by Hale, Higginson, or Wigglesworth—on the contrary, Cotton Mather, writing a year after the Salem Tragedy, almost chuckles over it: "In the whole—the Devil got just nothing—but God got praises. Christ got subjects, the Holy Spirit got temples, the church got addition, and the souls of men got everlasting benefits."—Calef, 12.

Stoughton remained nearly the whole time, until his death, in May, 1702, in control of affairs. By his influence over the Government and that of the Mathers over the Clergy, nothing was done to remove the dark stigma from the honor of the Province, and no seasonable or adequate reparation ever made for the Great Wrong.

I am additionally indebted to the kindness of Dr. Moore for the following extracts from a Sermon to the General Assembly, delivered by Cotton Mather, in 1709, intitled "Theopolis Americana. Pure Gold in the market place."

"In two or three too Memorable Days of Temptation, that have been upon us, there have been Errors Committed. You are always ready to Declare unto all the World, 'That you disapprove those Errors.' You are willing to inform all mankind with your Declarations.

"That no man may be Persecuted, because he is Conscienciously not of the same Religious Opinions, with those that are uppermost.

"And; That Persons are not to be judged Confederates with Evil Spirits, merely because the Evil Spirits do make Possessed People cry out upon them.

"Could any thing be Proposed further, by way of Reparation, [Besides the General Day of Humiliation, which was appointed and observed thro' the Province, to bewayl the Errors of our Dark time, some years ago:] You would be willing to hearken to it."

The suggestion thus made, not, it must be confessed, in very urgent terms, did not, it is probable, produce much impression. The preacher seemed to rest upon the Proclamation issued by Stoughton, some eleven years before. Coupling the two errors specified together, was not calculated to give effect to the recommendation. Public opinion was not, then, prepared to second such enlightened views as to religious liberty.

It is very noticeable that Mather here must be considered as admitting that "in the Dark time," persons were judged "Confederates with Evil Spirits," "merely" because of Spectral Evidence.

All that was said, on this occasion, does not amount to any thing, as an expression of personal opinion or feeling, relating to points on which Hale and Higginson uttered their deep sensibility, and Wigglesworth had addressed to the Mathers and other Ministers, his solemn and searching appeal. The duty of reparation for the great wrong was thrown off upon others, than those particularly and prominently responsible.

Nothing has led me to suppose that Cotton Mather was cruel or heartless, in his natural or habitual disposition. He never had the wisdom or dignity to acknowledge, as an individual, or as one of the Clergy, or to propose specific reparation for, the fearful mischiefs, sufferings and horrors growing out of the witchcraft prosecutions. The extent to which he was at the time, and probably always continued to be, the victim of baleful superstitions, is his only apology, and we must allow it just weight.

A striking instance of the occasional ascendency of his better feelings, and of the singular methods in which he was accustomed to act, is presented in the following extract from his Diary, at a late period of his life. We may receive it as an indication that he was not insensible of his obligation to do good, where, with his participation, so much evil had been done: "There is a town in this country, namely, Salem, which has many poor and bad people in it, and such as are especially scandalous for staying at home on the Lord's day. I wrapped up seven distinct parcels of money and annexed seven little books about repentance, and seven of the monitory letter against profane absence from the house of God. I sent those things with a nameless letter unto the Minister of that Town, and desired and empowered him to dispense the charity in his own name, hoping thereby the more to ingratiate his ministry with the people. Who can tell how far the good Angels of Heaven cooperate in those proceeding?"



XVI.

HISTORY OF OPINION AS TO COTTON MATHER, CONTINUED. FRANCIS HUTCHINSON. DANIEL NEAL. ISAAC WATTS. THOMAS HUTCHINSON. WILLIAM BENTLEY. JOHN ELIOT. JOSIAH QUINCY.

It was the common opinion in England, that the Mathers, particularly the younger, were pre-eminently responsible for the proceedings at Salem, in 1692. Francis Hutchinson, in the work from which I have quoted, speaks of the whole system of witchcraft doctrine, as "fantastic notions," which are "so far from raising their sickly visions into legal evidence, that they are grounded upon the very dregs of Pagan and Popish superstitions, and leave the lives of innocent men naked, without defence against them;" and in giving a list of books, written for upholding them, mentions, "Mr. Increase and Mr. Cotton Mather's several tracts;" and, in his Chapter on Witchcraft in Massachusetts, in 1692, commends the book of "Mr. Calef, a Merchant in that Plantation."

About the same time, the Rev. Daniel Neal, the celebrated author of the History of the Puritans, wrote a History of New England, in which he gives place to a brief, impartial, and just account of the witchcraft proceedings, in 1692. He abstains from personal criticisms, but expresses this general sentiment: "Strange were the mistakes that some of the wisest and best men of the country committed on this occasion; which must have been fatal to the whole Province, if God, in his Providence, had not mercifully interposed." The only sentence that contains a stricture on Cotton Mather, particularly, is that in which he thus refers to his statement that a certain confession was freely made. Neal quietly suggests, "whether the act of a man in prison, and under apprehension of death, may be called free, I leave others to judge." Dr. Isaac Watts, having read Neal's book, thought it necessary to write a letter to Cotton Mather, dated February 10, 1720; (Massachusetts Historical Collections, I., v., 200) and, describing a conversation he had just been having with Neal, says: "There is another thing, wherein my brother is solicitous lest he should have displeased you, and that is, the Chapter on Witchcraft, but, as he related matters of fact, by comparison of several authors, he hopes that you will forgive that he has not fallen into your sentiments exactly." The anxiety felt by Neal and Watts, lest the feelings of Mather might be wounded, shows what they thought of his implication with the affair. This inference is rendered unavoidable, when we examine Neal's book and find that he quotes or refers to Calef, all along, without the slightest question as to his credibility, receiving his statements and fully recognizing his authority. Indeed, his references to Calef are about ten to one oftener than to Mather. The attempt of Neal and Watts to smooth the matter down, by saying that the former had been led to his conclusions by "a comparison of several authors," could have given little satisfaction to Mather, as the authors whom he chiefly refers to, are Calef and Mather; and, comparing them with each other, he followed Calef.

The impression thus held in England, even by Mather's friends and correspondents, that he was unpleasantly connected with the Witchcraft of 1692, has been uniformly experienced, on both sides of the water, until this Reviewer's attempt to erase it from the minds of men.

Thomas Hutchinson was born in 1711, and brought up in the neighborhood of the Mathers; finishing his collegiate course and taking his Bachelor's degree at Harvard College, in 1727, a year before the death of Cotton Mather. He had opportunities to form a correct judgment about Salem Witchcraft and the chief actor in the proceedings, greater than any man of his day; but his close family connection with the Mathers imposed some restraint upon his expressions; not enough, however, to justify the statement of the Reviewer that he does not mention the "agency" of Cotton Mather in that transaction. There are several very distinct references to Mather's "agency," in Hutchinson's account of the transactions connected with Salem Witchcraft, some of which I have cited. I ask to whom does the following passage refer?—ii., 63.—"One of the Ministers, who, in the time of it, was fully convinced that the complaining persons were no impostors, and who vindicated his own conduct and that of the Court, in a Narrative he published, remarks, not long after, in his Diary, that many were of opinion that innocent blood had been shed."

This shows that Hutchinson regarded Cotton Mather's agency in the light in which I have represented it; that he considered him as wholly committed to the then prevalent delusion; as acting a part that identified him with the prosecutions; and that the Narrative he published was a joint vindication of himself and the Court. Hutchinson fastens the passage upon Mather, by the reference to the Diary; and while he says that it contained a statement, that many believed the persons who suffered innocent, he avoids saying that such was the opinion of the author of the Diary.

Finally, his taking particular pains to do it, by giving a Note to the purpose of expressing his confidence in Calef, pronouncing him a "fair relator"—ii., 56—proves that Governor Hutchinson held the opinion about Mather's "agency," which has always heretofore been ascribed to him.

William Bentley, D.D., was born in Boston, and for a large part of the first half of his life resided, as his family had done for a long period, in the North part of that Town. He was of a turn of mind to gather all local traditions, and, through all his days, devoted to antiquarian pursuits. No one of his period paid more attention to the subject of the witchcraft delusion. For much of our information concerning it, we are indebted to his History and Description of Salem, printed in 1800—Massachusetts Historical Collections, I., vi.—After relating many of its incidents, he breaks forth in condemnation of those who, disapproving, at the time, of the proceedings, did not come out and denounce them. Holding the opinion, which had come down from the beginning, that Increase Mather disapproved of the transaction, he indignantly repudiates the idea of giving him any credit therefor. "Increase Mather did not oppose Cotton Mather"—this is the utterance of a received, and, to him, unquestioned, opinion that Cotton Mather approved of, and was a leading agent in, the prosecutions.

The views of Dr. John Eliot, are freely given, to the same effect, in his Biographical Dictionary, as will presently be shown.

The late Josiah Quincy had studied the annals of Massachusetts with the thoroughness with which he grappled every subject to which he turned his thoughts. His ancestral associations covered the whole period of its history; and all the channels of the local traditions of Boston were open to his enquiring and earnest mind. His History of Harvard University is a monument that will stand forever. In that work, he speaks of the agreement of Stoughton's views with those of the Mathers; and, in connection with the witchcraft delusion, says that both of them "had an efficient agency in producing and prolonging that excitement." "The conduct of Increase Mather, in relation to it, was marked with caution and political skill; but that of his son, Cotton Mather, was headlong, zealous, and fearless, both as to character and consequences. In its commencement and progress, his activity is every-where conspicuous."

The Reviewer represents Mr. Quincy as merely repeating what I had said in my Lectures. He makes the same reckless assertion in reference to Bancroft, the late William B. O. Peabody, D.D., and every one else, who has written upon the subject, since 1831. The idea that Josiah Quincy "took his cue" from me, is simply preposterous. He does not refer to me, nor give any indication that he had ever seen my Lectures, but cites Calef, as his authority, over and over again. Dr. Peabody refers to Calef throughout, and draws upon him freely and with confidence, as every one else, who has written about the transaction, has probably done.

It may safely be said, that no historical fact has ever been more steadily recognized, than the action and, to a great degree, controlling agency, of Cotton Mather, in supporting and promoting the witchcraft proceedings of 1692. That it has, all along, been the established conviction of the public mind, is proved by the chronological series of names I have produced. Thomas Hutchinson, John Eliot, William Bentley, and Josiah Quincy, cover the whole period from Cotton Mather's day to this. They knew, as well as any other men that can be named, the current opinions, transmitted sentiments, and local and personal annals, of Boston. They reflect with certainty an assurance, running in an unbroken course over a century and a half. Their family connections, social position, conversance with events, and familiar knowledge of what men thought, believed, and talked about, give to their concurrent and continuous testimony, a force and weight of authority that are decisive; and demonstrate that, instead of my having invented and originated the opinion of Cotton Mather's agency in the matter now under consideration, I have done no more than to restate what has been believed and uttered from the beginning.

The writer in the North American says: "Within the last forty years, there has grown up a fashion, among our historical writers, of defaming his character and underrating his productions. For a specimen of these attacks, the reader is referred to a Supposed Letter from Rev. Cotton Mather, D.D., with comments on the same by James Savage." The article mentioned consists of the "supposed letter," and a very valuable communication from the late Rev. Samuel Sewall, with some items by Mr. Savage—[Massachusetts Historical Collections, IV., ii., 122.] Neither of these enlightened, faithful, and indefatigable scholars is to be disposed of in this style. They followed no "fashion;" and their venerable names are held in honor by all true disciples of antiquarian and genealogical learning. The author of such works, in this department, as Mr. Savage has produced, cannot be thus set aside by a magisterial and supercilious waving of the hand of this Reviewer.



XVII.

THE EFFECT UPON THE POWER OF THE MATHERS, IN THE PUBLIC AFFAIRS OF THE PROVINCE, OF THEIR CONNECTION WITH WITCHCRAFT.

The Reviewer takes exception to my statement, that the connection of the Mathers with the witchcraft business, "broke down" their influence in public affairs. What are the facts? It has been shown, that the administration of Sir William Phips, at its opening, was under their control, to an extent never equalled by that of private men over a Government. The prayers of Cotton Mather were fully answered; and if wise and cautious counsels had been given, what both father and son had so coveted, in the political management of the Province, would have been permanently realized. But, aiming to arm themselves with terrific and overwhelming strength, by invoking the cooperation of forces from the spiritual, invisible, and diabolical world, with rash "precipitancy," they hurried on the witchcraft prosecutions. The consequence was, that in six months, the whole machinery on which they had placed their reliance was prostrate. At the very next election, Elisha Cook was chosen and Nathaniel Saltonstall rechosen, to the Council; and, ever after, the Mathers were driven to the wall, in desperate and unavailing self-defence.

No party or faction could claim the Earl of Bellamont, during his brief administration, covering but fourteen months. Although the only nobleman ever sent over as Governor of Massachusetts, more than all others, he conciliated the general good will. His short term of office and wise policy prevented any particular advantage to the Mathers from the dedication to him of the Life of Phips. During the entire period, between 1692 and the arrival of Dudley to the Government, the opponents of the Mathers were steadily increasing their strength. Opposition to Increase Mather was soon developed in attempts to remove him from the Presidency of Harvard College. In 1701, an Order was passed by the General Court, "that no man should act as President of the College, who did not reside at Cambridge." This decided the matter. Increase Mather resigned, on the sixth of September following; and, the same day, the Rev. Samuel Willard took charge of the College, under the title of Vice-president, and acted as President, to the acceptance of the people and with the support of the Government of the Province, to his death, in 1707—all the while allowed to retain the pastoral connection with his Church, in Boston.

Joseph Dudley arrived from England, on the eleventh of June, 1702, with his Commission, as Captain-general and Governor of the Province. On the sixteenth, he made a call upon Cotton Mather, who relates the interview in his Diary. It seems that Mather made quite a speech to the new Governor, urging him "to carry an indifferent hand toward all parties," and explaining his meaning thus: "By no means, let any people have cause to say that you take all your measures from the two Mr. Mathers." He then added: "By the same rule, I may say without offence, by no means let any people say that you go by no measures in your conduct but Mr. Byfield's and Mr. Leverett's. This I speak, not from any personal prejudice against the gentlemen, but from a due consideration of the disposition of the people, and as a service to your Excellency."

Dudley—whether judging rightly or not is to be determined by taking into view his position, the then state of parties, and the principles of human nature—evidently regarded this as a trap. If he had followed the advice, and kept aloof from Byfield and Leverett, they would have been placed at a distance from him, and he would necessarily have fallen into the hands of the Mathers. He may have thought that the only way to avoid such a result, was for him to explain to those gentlemen his avoidance of them, by mentioning to them what Mather had said to him, thereby signifying to them, that, as a matter of policy, he thought it best to adopt the suggestion and stand aloof from both sides. Whether acting from this consideration or from resentment, he informed them of it; whereupon Mather inserted this in his Diary: "The WRETCH went unto those men and told them that I had advised him to be no ways directed by them, and inflamed them into implacable rage against me."

After this, the relations between Dudley and the Mathers must have been sufficiently awkward and uncomfortable; but no particular public demonstrations appear to have been made, on either side, for some time.

Mr. Willard died on the twelfth of September, 1707; and the great question again rose as to the proper person to be called to the head of the College. The extraordinary learning of Cotton Mather undoubtedly gave him commanding and pre-eminent claims in the public estimation; and he had reason to think that the favorite object of his ambition was about to be attained. But he was doomed to bitter disappointment. On the twenty-eighth of October, the Corporation, through its senior member, the Rev. James Allen of Boston, communicated to the Governor the vote of that body, appointing the "Honorable John Leverett" to the Presidency; and, on the fourteenth of January, 1708, he was publicly inducted to office. The Mathers could stand it no longer; but, six days after, addressed, each, a letter to Dudley, couched in the bitterest and most abusive terms.—[Massachusetts Historical Society's Collections, I., iii., 126.] No explosions of disappointed politicians and defeated aspirants for office, in our day, surpass these letters. They show how deeply the writers were stung. They heap maledictions on the Governor, without any of the restraints of courtesy or propriety. They charge him with all sorts of malversation in office, bribery, peculation, extortion, falseness, hypocrisy, and even murder; imputing to him "the guilt of innocent blood," because, many years before, he had, as Chief-justice of New York, presided at the Trial of Leisler and Milburn; and averring that "those men were not only murdered, but barbarously murdered."

It is observable that some of the heinous crimes charged upon Dudley, occurred before his arrival as Governor of Massachusetts, in 1702; and that, in these very letters, they remind him that it was, in part, by their influence that he was then appointed, and that a letter from Cotton Mather, in favor of his appointment, was read before "the late King William." Both the Mathers were remarkable for a lack of vision, in reference to the logical bearing of what they said. It did not occur to them, that the fact of their soliciting his appointment closed their mouths from making charges for public acts well known to them at the time.

Dudley says that he was assured by the Mathers, on his arrival, that he had the favor of all good men; and Cotton Mather, in his letter, reminds him that he signalized his friendly feelings, by giving to the public, on that occasion, the "portraiture of a good man." It is proved, therefore, by the evidence on both sides, that, well knowing all about the Leisler affair and other crimes alleged against him, they were ready, and most desirous, to secure his favor and friendship; and to identify themselves with his administration.

In alluding to these letters, Hutchinson (History, ii., 194,) says: "In times when party spirit prevails, what will not a Governor's enemies believe, however injurious and absurd? At such a time, he was charged with dispensing summum jus to Leisler and incurring an aggravated guilt of blood beyond that of a common murderer. The other party, no doubt, would have charged the failure of justice upon him, if Leisler had been acquitted."

Dudley replied to both these extraordinary missives, in a letter dated the third of February, 1708. After rebuking, in stern and dignified language, the tone and style of their letters, reminding them, by apt citations from Scripture of the "laws of wise and Christian reproof," which they had violated, and showing upon what false foundations their charges rested, he says: "Can you think it the most proper season to do me good by your admonitions, when you have taken care to let the world know you are out of frame and filled with the last prejudice against my person and Government?" "Every one can see through the pretence, and is able to account for the spring of these letters, and how they would have been prevented, without easing any grievances you complain of." He makes the following proposal: "After all, though I have reason to complain to heaven and earth of your unchristian rashness, and wrath, and injustice, I would yet maintain a christian temper towards you. I do, therefore, now assure you that I shall be ready to give you all the satisfaction Christianity requires, in those points which are proper for you to seek to receive it in, when, with a proper temper and spirit, giving me timely notice, you do see meet to make me a visit for that end; and I expect the same satisfaction from you." He offers this significant suggestion: "I desire you will keep your station, and let fifty or sixty good Ministers, your equals in the Province, have a share in the Government of the College and advise thereabouts, as well as yourselves, and I hope all will be well." He concludes by claiming that he is sustained by the favor of the "Ministers of New England;" and characterises the issue between him and them thus: "The College must be disposed against the opinion of all the Ministers in New England, except yourselves, or the Governor torn in pieces. This is the view I have of your inclination."

Dudley continued to administer the Government for eight years longer, until the infirmities of age compelled him to retire. Both Hutchinson and Doctor John Eliot give us to understand that he conducted the public affairs with great ability and success, with the general approval of all classes, and particularly of the Clergy. His statement that he had the support of all the Ministers of New England, except the Mathers, was undoubtedly correct. It is certainly true of the Ministers of Boston. In his Diary, under the year 1709, Cotton Mather says: "The other Ministers of the Town are this day feasting with our wicked Governor. I have, by my provoking plainness and freedom, in telling this Ahab of his wickedness, procured myself to be left out of his invitations. I rejoiced in my liberty from the temptations wherewith they were encumbered." He set apart that day for fasting and prayer, the special interest of which, he says, "was to obtain deliverance and protection" from his "enemies," whose names, he informs us, he "mentioned unto the Lord, who had promised to be my shield."

The bitterness with which Mather felt exclusion from power is strikingly illustrated in a letter addressed by him to Stephen Sewall, published by me in the Appendix to the edition of my Lectures, printed in 1831. I subjoin a few extracts: "A couple of malignant fellows, a while since, railing at me in the Bookseller's shop, among other things they said, 'and his friend Noyes has cast him off,' at which they set up a laughter." "No doubt, you understand, how ridiculously things have been managed in our late General Assembly; voting and unvoting, the same day; and, at last, the squirrels perpetually running into the mouth open for them, though they had cried against it wonderfully. And your neighbor, Sowgelder, after his indefatigable pains at the castration of all common honesty, rewarded, before the Court broke up, with being made one of your brother Justices; which the whole House, as well as the apostate himself, had in view, all along, as the expected wages of his iniquity." "If things continue in the present administration, there will shortly be not so much as a shadow of justice left in the country. Bribery, a crime capital among the Pagans, is already a peccadillo among us. All officers are learning it. And, if I should say, Judges will find the way to it, some will say, there needs not the future tense in the case." "Every thing is betrayed, and that we, on the top of our house, may complete all, our very religion, with all the Churches, is at last betrayed—the treachery carried on with lies, and fallacious representations, and finished by the rash hands of our Clergy."

That Cotton Mather continued all his subsequent life to experience the dissatisfaction, and give way to the feelings, of a disappointed man, is evident from his Diary. I have quoted from it a few passages. The Reviewer says it "is full of penitential confessions," and seems to liken him, in this respect, to the Apostle of the Gentiles. Speaking of my having cited the Diary, as historical evidence, he says: "Such a use of the confessional, we believe, is not common with historical writers." I do not remember anything like "penitential confessions," in the passages from the Diary given in my book. The reader is referred to them, in Volume II., Page 503. They belong to the year 1724, and are thus prefaced:

"DARK DISPENSATIONS, BUT LIGHT ARISING IN DARKNESS."

"It may be of some use to me, to observe some very dark dispensations, wherein the recompense of my poor essays at well-doing, in this life, seem to look a little discouraging; and then to express the triumph of my faith over such and all discouragements." "Of the things that look dark, I may touch of twice seven instances."

The writer, in the Christian Examiner, November, 1831, from whom I took them, omitted two, "on account of their too personal or domestic character."

I cannot find the slightest trace of a penitential tear on those I have quoted; and cite now but one of them, as pertinent to the point I am making: "What has a gracious Lord given me to do for the good of the country? in applications without number for it, in all its interests, besides publications of things useful to it, and for it. And, yet, there is no man whom the country so loads with disrespect, and calumnies, and manifold expressions of aversion."

This is a specimen of the whole of them—one half recounting what he had done, the other complaining, sometimes almost scolding, at the poor requital he had received.

President Leverett died on the third of May, 1724. His death was lamented by the country; and the most eminent men vied with each other in doing honor to his memory. The Rev. Benjamin Colman called him "our master," and pronounced his life as "great and good." "The young men saw him and hid themselves, and the aged arose and stood up." Dr. Appleton declared that he had been "an honored ornament to his country. Verily, the breach is so wide, that none but an all-sufficient God (with whom is the residue of the Spirit) can repair or heal it." The late Benjamin Peirce, in his History of Harvard University, says that "his Presidency was successful and brilliant." He was honored abroad, as well as at home; and his name is inscribed on the rolls of the Royal Society of London. Mr. Peirce says: "He had a great and generous soul." His natural abilities were of a very high order. His attainments were profound and extensive. He was well acquainted with the learned languages, with the arts and "sciences, with history, philosophy, law, divinity, politics." Such, we are told, were "the majesty and marks of greatness, in his speech, his behaviour, and his very countenance," that the students of the College were inspired with reverence and affection. In his earlier and later life, he had been connected with the College, as Tutor and as President; and in the intermediate period, he had filled the highest legislative and judicial stations, and been intrusted with the most important functions connected with the military service. I am inclined to think, all things considered, a claim, in his behalf, might be put in for the distinction the Reviewer awards to Cotton Mather, as "doubtless the most brilliant man of his day in New England."

President Leverett was buried on the sixth of May. Cotton Mather officiated as one of the Pall-bearers, and then went home, and made the following entry in his Diary, dated the seventh: "The sudden death of that unhappy man who sustained the place of President in our College, will open a door for my doing singular services in the best of interests. I do not know that the care of the College will now be cast upon me; though I am told it is what is most generally wished for. If it should be, I shall be in abundance of distress about it; but, if it should not, yet I may do many things for the good of the College more quietly and more hopefully than formerly."

As time wore away, and no choice of President was made, he became more and more sensible that an influence, hostile to him, was in the ascendency; and, on the first of July, he writes thus, in his Diary: "This day being our insipid, ill-contrived anniversary, which we call Commencement, I chose to spend it at home, in supplications, partly on the behalf of the College, that it may not be foolishly thrown away, but that God may bestow such a President upon it, as may prove a rich blessing unto it and unto all our Churches."

In the meanwhile, he renewed his attendance at the meetings of the Overseers; having never occupied his seat, in that Body, with the exception of a single Session, during the whole period of Leverett's presidency. The Board, at a meeting he attended, on the sixth of August, 1724, passed a vote advising and directing the speedy election of a President. On the eleventh, the Corporation chose the Rev. Joseph Sewall of the Old South Church; and Mather records the event in his Diary, as follows: "I am informed that, yesterday, the six men, who call themselves the Corporation of the College, met, and, contrary to the epidemical expectation of the country, chose a modest young man, Sewall, of whose piety (and little else) every one gives a laudable character."

"I always foretold these two things of the Corporation: First, that, if it were possible for them to steer clear of me, they will do so. Secondly, that, if it were possible for them to act foolishly, they will do so. The perpetual envy with which my essays to serve the kingdom of God are treated among them, and the dread that Satan has of my beating up his quarters at the College, led me into the former sentiment; the marvellous indiscretion, with which the affairs of the College are managed, led me into the latter."

Mr. Sewall declined the appointment. On the eighteenth of November, the Rev. Benjamin Colman, of the Brattle-street Church, was chosen. He also declining, the Rev. Benjamin Wadsworth, of the First Church, was elected, in June, 1725, and inaugurated on the seventh of July.

It thus appears that Dr. Mather was pointedly passed over; and every other Minister of Boston successively chosen to that great office.

Of course he took, as Mr. Peirce informs us, no further part in the management of the College. While he considered, as he expressed it, the "senselessness" of those entrusted with its affairs, as threatening "little short of a dissolution of the College," yet he persuaded himself that he had never desired the office. He had, he says, "unspeakable cause to admire the compassion of Heaven, in saving him from the appointment;" and that he had always had a "dread of what the generality of sober men" thought he desired—"dismal apprehension of the distresses which a call at Cambridge would bring" upon him.—He was sincere in those declarations, no doubt; but they show how completely he could blind himself to the past and even to the actual present. Mr. Peirce explains why the Corporation were so resolute in withholding their suffrages from Mather: "His contemporaries appear to have formed a very correct estimate of his character." "They saw, what posterity sees, that he was a man of wonderful parts, of immense learning, and of eminent piety and virtue." "They saw his weakness and eccentricities." "It is evident that his judgment was not equal to his other faculties; that his passions, which were naturally strong and violent, were not always under proper regulation; that he was weak, credulous, enthusiastic, and superstitious. His conversation is said to have been instructive and entertaining, in a high degree, though often marred by levity, vanity, imprudence and puns." For these reasons, he was deemed an unsuitable person for the Presidency of the College.



XVIII.

COTTON MATHER'S WRITINGS AND CHARACTER.

While compelled—by the attempt of the writer in the North American Review to reverse the just verdict of history in reference to Cotton Mather's connection with Salem Witchcraft—to show the unhappy part he acted and the terrible responsibility he incurred, in bringing forward, and carrying through its stages, that awful tragedy, and the unworthy means he used to throw that responsibility, afterwards, on others, I am not to be misled into a false position, in reference to this extraordinary man. I endorse the language of Mr. Peirce: "He possessed great vigor and activity of mind, quickness of apprehension, a lively imagination, a prodigious memory, uncommon facility in acquiring and communicating knowledge, with the most indefatigable application and industry; that he amassed an immense store of information on all subjects, human and divine." I follow Mr. Peirce still further, in believing that his natural temperament was pleasant and his sentiments of a benevolent cast: "that he was an habitual promoter and doer of good, is evident, as well from his writings as from the various accounts that have been transmitted respecting him."

If the question is asked, as it naturally will be, how these admissions can be reconciled with the views and statements respecting him, contained in this article and in my book on witchcraft, the answer is: that mankind is not divided into two absolutely distinct and entirely separated portions—one good and the other evil. The good are liable to, and the bad are capable of, each receiving much into their own lives and characters, that belongs to the other. This interfusion universally occurs. The great errors and the great wrongs imputable to Cotton Mather do not make it impracticable to discern what was commendable in him. They may be accounted for without throwing him out of the pale of humanity or our having to shut our eyes to traits and merits other ways exhibited.

The extraordinary precocity of his intellect—itself always a peril, often a life-long misfortune—awakened vanity and subjected him to the flattery by which it is fed. All ancestral associations and family influences pampered it. Such a speech as that made to him, at his graduation, by President Oakes, could not have failed to have inflated it to exaggerated dimensions. Clerical and political ambition was natural, all but instinctive, to one, whose father, and both whose grandfathers, had been powers, in the State as well as Church. The religious ideas, if they can be so called, in which he had been trained from childhood, in a form bearing upon him with more weight than upon any other person in all history, inasmuch, as they constituted the prominent feature of his father's reading, talk, thoughts, and writings, gave a rapid and overshadowing growth to credulity and superstition. A defect in his education, perhaps, in part, a natural defect, left him without any true logical culture, so that he seems, in his productions and conduct, not to discern the sequences of statements, the coherence of propositions, nor the consistency of actions, thereby entangling him in expressions and declarations that have the aspect of untruthfulness—his language often actually bearing that character, without his discerning it. His writings present many instances of this infirmity. Some have already been incidentally adduced. In his Life of Phips, avowing himself the author of the document known as the Advice of the Ministers, he uses this language: "By Mr. Mather the younger, as I have been informed." He had, in fact, never been so informed. He knew it by consciousness. Of course he had no thought of deceiving; but merely followed a habit he had got, of such modes of expression. So, also, when he sent a present of money and tracts to "poor and bad people," in Salem, with an anonymous letter to the Minister of the place, "desiring and empowering him to dispense the charity, in his own name, hoping thereby the more to ingratiate his ministry with the people," he looked only on one side of the proposal, and saw it in no other light than a benevolent and friendly transaction. It never occurred to him that he was suggesting a deceptive procedure and drawing the Minister into a false position and practice.

When, in addition, we consider to what he was exposed by his proclivity to, and aspirations for, political power, the expedients, schemes, contrivances, and appliances, in which he thereby became involved in the then state of things in the Colony, and the connection which leading Ministers, although not admitted to what are strictly speaking political offices, had with the course of public affairs—his father, to an extent never equalled by any other Clergyman, before or since—we begin to estimate the influences that disastrously swayed the mind of Cotton Mather.

Vanity, flattery, credulity, want of logical discernment, and the struggles between political factions, in the unsettled, uncertain, transition period, between the old and new Charters, are enough to account for much that was wrong, in one of Mather's temperament and passions, without questioning his real mental qualities, or, I am disposed to think, his conscious integrity, or the sincerity of his religious experiences or professions.

But his chief apology, after all, is to be found in the same sphere in which his chief offences were committed. Certain topics and notions, in reference to the invisible, spiritual, and diabolical world, whether of reality or fancy it matters not, had, all his life long, been the ordinary diet, the daily bread, of his mind.

It may, perhaps, be said with truth, that the theological imagery and speculations of that day, particularly as developed in the writings of the two Mathers, were more adapted to mislead the mind and shroud its moral sense in darkness, than any system, even of mythology, that ever existed. It was a mythology. It may be spoken of with freedom, now, as it has probably passed away, in all enlightened communities in Christendom. Satan was the great central character, in what was, in reality, a Pantheon. He was surrounded with hosts of infernal spirits, disembodied and embodied, invisible demons, and confederate human agents. He was seen in everything, everywhere. His steps were traced in extraordinary occurrences and in the ordinary operations of nature. He was hovering over the heads of all, and lying in wait along every daily path. The affrighted imagination, in every scene and mode of life, was conversant with ghosts, apparitions, spectres, devils. This prevalent, all but universal, exercise of credulous fancy, exalted into the most imposing dignity of theology and faith, must have had a demoralizing effect upon the rational condition and faculties of men, and upon all discrimination and healthfulness of thought. When error, in its most extravagant forms, had driven the simplicity of the Gospel out of the Church and the world, it is not to be wondered at that the mind was led to the most shocking perversions, and the conscience ensnared to the most indefensible actions.

The superstition of that day was foreshadowed in the ferocious cannibal of classic mythology—a monster, horrific, hideous in mien, and gigantic in stature. It involved the same fate. The eye of the intellect was burned out, the light of reason extinguished—cui lumen ademptum.

Having always given himself up to the contemplation of diabolical imaginations, Cotton Mather was led to take the part he did, in the witchcraft proceedings; and it cannot be hidden from the light of history. The greater his talents, the more earnestly he may, in other matters, have aimed to be useful, the more weighty is the lesson his course teaches, of the baleful effects of bewildering and darkening superstition.

There is another, and a special, explanation to be given of the disingenuousness that appears in his writings. He was a master of language. He could express, with marvelous facility, any shade of thought. He could also make language conceal thought. No one ever handled words with more adroitness. He could mould them to suit his purposes, at will, and with ease. This faculty was called in requisition by the special circumstances of his times. It was necessary to preserve, at least, the appearance of unity among the Churches, while there was as great a tendency, then, as ever, to diversity of speculations, touching points of casuistical divinity or ministerial policy. The talent to express in formulas, sentiments that really differed, so as to obscure the difference, was needed; and he had it. He knew how to frame a document that would suit both sides, but, in effect, answer the purposes of one of them, as in the Advice of the Ministers. He could assert a proposition and connect with it what appeared to be only a judicious modification or amplification, but which, in reality, was susceptible of being interpreted as either more or less corroborating or contradicting it, as occasion might require. This was a sort of sleight of hand, in the use of words; and was noticed, at the time, as "legerdemain." He practised it so long that it became a feature of his style; and he actually, in this way, deceived himself as well as others. It is a danger to which ingenious and hair-splitting writers are liable. I am inclined to think that what we cannot but regard as patent misstatements, were felt by him to be all right, in consequence, as just intimated, of this acquired habit.

His style is sprightly, and often entertaining. Neal, the author of the History of the Puritans, in a letter to the Rev. Benjamin Colman, after speaking with commendation of one of Cotton Mather's productions, says: "It were only to be wished that it had been freed from those puns and jingles that attend all his writings, before it had been made public."—Massachusetts Historical Collections, I., v., 199.—Mr. Peirce, it has been observed, speaks of his "puns," in conversation. It is not certain, but that, to a reader now, these very things constitute a redeeming attraction of his writings and relieve the mind of the unpleasant effects of his credulity and vanity, pedantic and often far-fetched references, palpable absurdities, and, sometimes, the repulsiveness of his topics and matter.

The Reviewer represents me as prejudiced against Cotton Mather. Far from it. Forty-three years ago, before my attention had been particularly called to his connection with alleged witchcrafts or with the political affairs of his times, I eulogized his "learning and liberality," in warm terms.—Sermon at the Dedication of the House of Worship of the First Church, in Salem, Massachusetts, 48.

I do not retract what I then said. Cotton Mather was in advance of his times, in liberality of feeling, in reference to sectarian and denominational matters. He was, undoubtedly, a great student, and had read all that an American scholar could then lay his hands on. Marvellous stories were told of the rapidity of his reading. He was a devourer of books. At the same time, I vindicated him, without reserve, from the charge of pedantry. This I cannot do now. Observation and reflection have modified my views. He made a display, over all his pages, of references and quotations from authors then, as now, rarely read, and of anecdotes, biographical incidents, and critical comments relating to scholars and eminent persons, of whom others have but little information, and of many of whom but few have ever heard. This filled his contemporaries with wonder; led to most extravagant statements, in funeral discourses, by Benjamin Colman, Joshua Gee, and others; and made the general impression that has come down to our day. Without detracting from his learning, which was truly great, it cannot be denied that this superfluous display of it subjects him, justly to the imputation of pedantry. It may be affected where, unlike the case of Cotton Mather, there is, in reality, no very extraordinary amount of learning. It is a trick of authorship easily practised.

Any one reading Latin with facility, having a good memory, and keeping a well-arranged scrap-book, needs less than half a dozen such books as the following, to make a show of learning and to astonish the world by his references and citations—the six folio volumes of Petavius, on Dogmatic Theology, and his smaller work, Rationarium Temporum, a sort of compendium or schedule of universal history; and a volume printed, in the latter half of the seventeenth century, at Amsterdam, compiled by Limborch, consisting of an extensive collection of letters to and from the most eminent men of that and the preceding century, such as Arminius, Vossius, Episcopius, Grotius, and many others, embracing a vast variety of literary history, criticism, biography, theology, philosophy, and ecclesiastical matters—I have before me the copy of this work, owned by that prodigy of learning, Dr. Samuel Parr, who pronounced it "a precious book;" and it may have contributed much to give to his productions, that air of rare learning that astonished his contemporaries. To complete the compendious apparatus, and give the means of exhibiting any quantity of learning, in fields frequented by few, the only other book needed is Melchior Adams's Lives of Literati, including all most prominently connected with Divinity, Philosophy, and the progress of learning and culture, during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and down to its date, 1615. I have before me, the copy of this last work, owned by Richard Mather, and probably brought over with him, in his perilous voyage, in 1635. It was, successively, in the libraries of his son, Increase, and his grandson, Cotton Mather. At a corner of one of the blank leaves, it is noted, apparently in the hand of Increase Mather: "began Mar. 1, finished April 30, 1676." According to the popular tradition, Cotton would have read it, in a day or two. It contains interesting items of all sorts—personal anecdotes, critical comments, and striking passages of the lives and writings of more than one hundred and fifty distinguished men, such as Erasmus, Fabricius, Faustus, Cranmer, Tremellius, Peter Martyr, Beza, and John Knox. Whether Mather had access to either of the above-named works, except the last, is uncertain; but, as his library was very extensive, he sparing no pains nor expense in furnishing it, and these books were severally then in print and precisely of the kind to attract him and suit his fancy, it is not unlikely that he had them all. They would have placed in easy reach, much of the mass of amazing erudition with which he "entertained" his readers and hearers.

Cotton Mather died on the thirteenth of February, 1728, at the close of his sixty-fifth year.

Thirty-six years had elapsed since the fatal imbroglio of Salem witchcraft. He had probably long been convinced that it was vain to attempt to shake the general conviction, expressed by Calef, that he had been "the most active and forward of any Minister in the country in those matters," and acquiesced in the general disposition to let that matter rest. It must be pleasing to all, to think that his very last years were freed from the influences that had destroyed the peace of his life and left such a shade over his name. Having met with nothing but disaster from attempting to manage the visible as well as the invisible world, he probably left them both in the hands of Providence; and experienced, as he had never done, a brief period of tranquillity, before finally leaving the scene. His aspiration to control the Province had ceased. The object of his life-long pursuit, the Presidency of the College, was forever baffled. Nothing but mischief and misery to himself and others had followed his attempt to lead the great combat against the Devil and his hosts. It had fired his early zeal and ambition; but that fire was extinguished. The two ties, which more than all others, had bound him, by his good affections and his unhappy passions, to what was going on around him, were severed, nearly at the same time, by the death of his father, in 1723, and of his great and successful rival, Leverett, in 1724. Severe domestic trials and bereavements completed the work of weaning him from the world; and it is stated that, in his very last years, the resentments of his life were buried and the ties of broken friendships restored. The pleasantest intercourse took place between him and Benjamin Colman; men of all parties sought his company and listened to the conversation, which was always one of his shining gifts; he had written kindly about Dudley; and his end was as peaceful as his whole life would have been, but for the malign influences I have endeavored to describe, leading him to the errors and wrongs which, while faithful history records them, men must regard with considerate candor, as God will with infinite mercy.

It is a curious circumstance, that the two great public funerals, in those early times, of which we have any particular accounts left, were of the men who, in life, had been so bitterly opposed to each other. When Leverett was buried, the cavalcade, official bodies, students, and people, "were fain to proceed near as far as Hastings' before they returned," so great was the length of the procession: the funeral of Mather was attended by the greatest concourse that had ever been witnessed in Boston.



XIX.

ROBERT CALEF'S WRITINGS AND CHARACTER.

I approach the close of this protracted discussion with what has been purposely reserved. The article in the North American Review rests, throughout, upon a repudiation of the authority of Robert Calef. Its writer says, "his faculties appear to us to have been of an inferior order." "He had a very feeble conception of what credible testimony is." "If he had not intentionally lied, he had a very imperfect appreciation of truth." He speaks of "Calef's disqualifications as a witness." He seeks to discredit him, by suggesting the idea that, in his original movements against Mather, he was instigated by pre-existing enmity—"Robert Calef, between whom and Mr. Mather a personal quarrel existed." "His personal enemy, Calef."

There is no evidence of any difficulty, nor of any thing that can be called "enmity," between these two persons, prior to their dealings with each other, in the Margaret Rule case, commencing on the thirteenth of September, 1693. Mather himself states, in his Diary, that the enmity between them arose out of Calef's opposition to his, Mather's, views relating to the "existence and influences of the invisible world." So far as we have any knowledge, their acquaintance began at the date just mentioned. The suggestion of pre-existing enmity, therefore, gives an unfair and unjust impression.

Robert Calef was a native of England, a young man, residing, first in Roxbury, and afterwards at Boston. He was reputed a person of good sense; and, from the manner in which Mather alludes to him, in one instance, of considerable means: he had, probably, been prosperous in his business, which was that of a merchant. Not a syllable is on record against his character, outside of his controversy with the Mathers; all that is known of him, on the contrary, indicates that he was an honorable and excellent person. He enjoyed the confidence of the people; and was called to municipal trusts, for which only reliable, discreet, vigilant, and honest citizens were selected, receiving the thanks of the Town for his services, as Overseer of the Poor. As he encountered the madness and violence of the people, when they were led by Cotton Mather, in the witchcraft delusion, it is a singular circumstance, constituting an honorable distinction, in which they shared, that, in a later period of their lives, they stood, shoulder to shoulder, breasting bravely together, another storm of popular fanaticism, by publicly favoring inoculation for the small-pox. He offered several of his children to be treated, at the hands of Dr. Boylston, in 1721. His family continued to bear up the respectability of the name, and is honorably mentioned in the municipal records. A vessel, named London, was a regular Packet-ship, between that port and Boston, and probably one of the largest class then built in America. She was commanded by "Robert Calef;" and, in the Boston Evening Post, of the second of May, 1774, "Dr. Calef of Ipswich" is mentioned among the passengers just arrived in her. Under his own, and other names, the descendants of the family of Calef are probably as numerous and respectable as those of the Mathers; and on that, as all other higher accounts, there is an equal demand for justice to their respective ancestors.

It is related by Mather, that a young woman, named Margaret Rule, belonging to the North part of Boston, "many months after the General Storm of the late enchantments, was over," "when the country had long lain pretty quiet," was "seized by the Evil Angels, both as to molestations and accusations from the Invisible World". On the Lord's Day, the tenth of September, 1693, "after some hours of previous disturbance of the public assembly, she fell into odd fits," and had to be taken out of the congregation and carried home, "where her fits, in a few hours, grew into a figure that satisfied the spectators of their being supernatural." He further says, that, "from the 10th of September to the 18th, she kept an entire fast, and yet, she was to all appearance as fresh, as lively, as hearty, at the nine days end, as before they began. In all this time she had a very eager hunger upon her stomach, yet if any refreshment were brought unto her, her teeth would be set, and she would be thrown into many miseries. Indeed, once, or twice, or so, in all this time, her tormentors permitted her to swallow a mouthful of somewhat that might increase her miseries, whereof a spoonful of rum was the most considerable."

The affair, of course, was noised abroad. It reached the ears of Robert Calef. On the thirteenth, after sunset, accompanied by some others, he went to the house, "drawn," as he says, "by curiosity to see Margaret Rule, and so much the rather, because it was reported Mr. Mather would be there, that night." They were taken into the chamber where she was in bed. They found her of a healthy countenance. She was about seventeen years of age. Increase and Cotton Mather came in, shortly afterwards, with others. Altogether, there were between thirty and forty persons in the room. Calef drew up Minutes of what was said and done. He repeated his visit, on the evening of the nineteenth. Cotton Mather had been with Margaret half an hour; and had gone before his arrival. Each night, Calef made written minutes of what was said and done, the accuracy of which was affirmed by the signatures of two persons, which they were ready to confirm with their oaths. He showed them to some of Mather's particular friends. Whereupon Mather preached about him; sent word that he should have him arrested for slander; and called him "one of the worst of liars." Calef wrote him a letter, on the twenty-ninth of September; and, in reference to the complaints and charges Mather was making, proposed that they should meet, in either of two places he mentioned, each accompanied by a friend, at which time he, Calef, would read to him the minutes he had taken, of what had occurred on the evenings of the thirteenth and nineteenth. Mather sent a long letter, not to be delivered, but read to him, in which he agreed to meet him, as proposed, at one of the places; but, in the mean time, on the complaint of the Mathers, for scandalous libels upon Cotton Mather, Calef was brought before "their Majesties Justice, and bound over to answer at Sessions." Mather, of course, failed to give him the meeting for conference, as agreed upon. On the twenty-fourth of November, Calef wrote to him again, referring to his failure to meet him and to the legal proceedings he had instituted; and, as the time for appearance in Court was drawing near, he "thought it not amiss to give a summary" of his views on the "great concern," as to which they were at issue. He states, at the outset, "that there are witches, is not the doubt." The Reviewer seizes upon this expression, to convey the idea that Calef was trying to conciliate Mather, and induce him to desist from the prosecution. Whoever reads the letter will see how unfair and untrue this is. Calef keeps to the point, which was not whether there were, or could be, witches; but whether the methods Mather was attempting, in the case of Margaret Rule, and which had been used in Salem, the year before, were legitimate or defensible. He was determined not to suffer the issue to be shifted.

Upon receiving this letter, Mather, who had probably, upon reflection, begun to doubt about the expediency of a public prosecution, signified that he had no desire to press the prosecution; and renewed the proposal for a conference. Calef "waited on Sessions;" but no one appearing against him, was dismissed. The affair seemed, at this crisis, to be tending toward an amicable conclusion. But Mather failed to meet him; and, on the eleventh of January, 1694, Calef addressed him again, recapitulating what had occurred, sending him copies of his previous letters and also of the Minutes he had taken of what occurred on the evenings of the thirteenth and nineteenth of September, with these words: "REVEREND SIR: Finding it necessary, on many accounts, I here present you with the copy of that Paper, which has been so much misrepresented, to the end, that what shall be found defective or not fairly represented, if any such shall appear, they may be set right."

This letter concludes in terms which show that, in that stage of the affair, Calef was disposed to treat Mather with great respect; and that he sincerely and earnestly desired and trusted that satisfaction might be given and taken, in the interview he so persistently sought—not merely in reference to the case of Margaret Rule, but to the general subject of witchcraft, on which they had different apprehensions: "I have reason to hope for a satisfactory answer to him, who is one that reverences your person and office."

This language strikingly illustrates the estimate in which Ministers were held. Reverence for their office and for them, as a body, pervaded all classes.

On the fifteenth of January, Mather replied complaining, in general terms, of the narrative contained in Calef's Minutes, as follows: "I do scarcely find any one thing, in the whole paper, whether respecting my father or myself, either fairly or truly represented." "The narrative contains a number of mistakes and falsehoods which, were they wilful and designed, might justly be termed great lies." He then goes into a specification of a few particulars, in which he maintains that the Minutes are incorrect.

On the eighteenth of January, Calef replied, reminding him that he had taken scarcely any notice of the general subject of diabolical agency; but that almost the whole of his letter referred to the Minutes of the meetings, on the thirteenth and nineteenth of September; and he maintains their substantial accuracy and shows that some of Mather's strictures were founded upon an incorrect reading of them. In regard to Mather's different recollection of some points, he expresses his belief that if his account, in the Minutes, "be not fully exact, it was as near as memory could bear away." He notices the fact that he finds in Mather's letter no objection to what related to matters of greatest concern. Mather had complained that the Minutes reported certain statements made by Rule, which had been used to his disadvantage; and Calef suggests, "What can be expected less from the father of lies, by whom, you judge, she was possest?"

Appended to Mather's letter, are some documents, signed by several persons, declaring that they had seen Rule lifted up by an invisible force from the bed to the top of the room, while a strong person threw his whole weight across her, and several others were trying with all their might to hold her down or pull her back. Upon these certificates, Calef remarks: "Upon the whole, I suppose you expect I should believe it; and if so, the only advantage gained is, that what has been so long controverted between Protestants and Papists, whether miracles are ceased, will hereby seem to be decided for the latter; it being, for ought I can see, if so, as true a miracle as for iron to swim; and the Devil can work such miracles."

Calef wrote to him again, on the nineteenth of February, once more praying that he would so far oblige him, as to give him his views, on the important subjects, for a right understanding of which he had so repeatedly sought a conference and written so many letters; and expressing his earnest desire to be corrected, if in error, to which end, if Mather would not, he indulged a hope that some others would, afford him relief and satisfaction. On the sixteenth of April, he wrote still another letter. In all of them, he touched upon the points at issue between them, and importuned Mather to communicate his views, fully, as to one seeking light. On the first of March, he wrote to a gentleman, an acknowledgment of having received, through his hands, "after more than a year's waiting," from Cotton Mather, four sheets of paper, not to be copied, and to be returned in a fortnight. Upon returning them, with comments, he desires the gentleman to request Mr. Mather not to send him any more such papers, unless he could be allowed to copy and use them. It seems that, in answer to a subsequent letter, Mather sent to him a copy of Richard Baxter's Certainty of the World of Spirits, to which, after some time, Calef found leisure to reply, expressing his dissent from the views given in that book, and treating the subject somewhat at large. In this letter, which closes his correspondence with Mather, he makes his solemn and severe appeal: "Though there is reason to hope that these diabolical principles have not so far prevailed (with multitudes of Christians), as that they ascribe to a witch and a devil the attributes peculiar to the Almighty; yet how few are willing to be found opposing such a torrent, as knowing that in so doing they shall be sure to meet with opposition to the utmost, from the many, both of Magistrates, Ministers, and people; and the name of Sadducee, atheist, and perhaps witch too, cast upon them, most liberally, by men of the highest profession in godliness; and, if not so learned as some of themselves, then accounted only fit to be trampled on, and their arguments (though both rational and scriptural) as fit only for contempt. But though this be the deplorable dilemma, yet some have dared, from time to time, (for the glory of God and the good and safety of men's lives, etc.) to run all these risks. And, that God who has said, 'My glory I will not give to another,' is able to protect those that are found doing their duty herein against all opposers; and, however otherwise contemptible, can make them useful in his own hand, who has sometimes chosen the weakest instruments that His power may be the more illustrious.

"And now, Reverend Sir, if you are conscious to yourself, that you have, in your principles or practices, been abetting to such grand errors, I cannot see how it can consist with sincerity, to be so convinced, in matters so nearly relating to the glory of God and lives of innocents, and, at the same time, so much to fear disparagement among men, as to trifle with conscience and dissemble an approving of former sentiments. You know that word, 'He that honoreth me I will honor, and he that despiseth me shall be lightly esteemed.' But, if you think that, in these matters, you have done your duty, and taught the people theirs; and that the doctrines cited from the above mentioned book [Baxter's] are ungainsayable; I shall conclude in almost his words. He that teaches such a doctrine, if through ignorance he believes not what he saith, may be a Christian; but if he believes them, he is in the broad path to heathenism, devilism, popery, or atheism. It is a solemn caution (Gal., i., 8): 'But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed.' I hope you will not misconstrue my intentions herein, who am, Reverend Sir, yours to command, in what I may."

Resolute in his purpose to bring the Ministers, if possible, to meet the questions he felt it his duty to have considered and settled, and careful to leave nothing undone that he could do, to this end, he sought the satisfaction from others, he had tried, in vain, to obtain from Mather. On the eighteenth of March, 1695, he addressed a letter "To the Ministers, whether English, French, or Dutch," calling their attention to "the mysterious doctrines" relating to the "power of the Devil," and to the subject of Witchcraft. On the twentieth of September, he wrote to the Rev. Samuel Willard, invoking his attention to the "great concern," and his aid in having it fairly discussed. On the twelfth of January, 1696, he addressed "The Ministers in and near Boston," for the same purpose; and wrote a separate letter to the Rev. Benjamin Wadsworth.

These documents were all composed with great earnestness, frankness, and ability; and are most creditable to his intelligence, courage, and sense of public duty. I have given this minute account of his proceedings with Mather and the Clergy generally, because I am impressed with a conviction that no instance can be found, in which a great question has been managed with more caution, deliberation, patience, manly openness and uprightness, and heroic steadiness and prowess, than this young merchant displayed, in compelling all concerned to submit to a thorough investigation and over-hauling of opinions and practices, established by the authority of great names and prevalent passions and prejudices, and hedged in by the powers and terrors of Church and State.

It seems to be evident that he must have received aid, in some quarter, from persons conversant with topics of learning and methods of treating such subjects, to an extent beyond the reach of a mere man of business. In the First Volume of the Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, Page 288, a Memorandum, from which I make an extract, is given, as found in Doctor Belknap's hand-writing, in his copy of Calef's book, in the collection, from the library of that eminent historian, presented by his heirs to that institution: "A young man of good sense, and free from superstition; a merchant in Boston. He was furnished with materials for his work, by Mr. Brattle of Cambridge, and his brother of Boston, and other gentlemen, who were opposed to the Salem proceedings.—E. P."

The fact that Belknap endorsed this statement, gives it sufficient credibility. Who the "E. P." was, from whom it was derived, is not known. If it were either of the Ebenezer Pembertons, father or son, no higher authority could be adduced. But whatever aid Calef received, he so thoroughly digested and appropriated, as to make him ready to meet Mather or any, or all, the other Ministers, for conference and debate; and his title to the authorship of the papers remains complete.

The Ministers did not give him the satisfaction he sought. They were paralyzed by the influence or the fear of the Mathers. Perhaps they were shocked, if not indignant, at a layman's daring to make such a movement against a Minister. It was an instance of the laying of unsanctified hands on the horns of the altar, such as had not been equalled in audacity, since the days of Anne Hutchinson, by any but Quakers. Calef, however, was determined to compel the attention of the world, if he could not that of the Ministers of Boston, to the subject; and he prepared, and sent to England, to be printed, a book, containing all that had passed, and more to the same purpose. It consists of several parts.

PART I. is An account of the afflictions of Margaret Rule, written by Cotton Mather, under the title of Another Brand plucked out of the Burning, or more Wonders of the Invisible World. In my book, the case of Margaret Rule is spoken of as having occurred the next "Summer" after the witchcraft delusion in Salem. This gives the Reviewer a chance to strike at me, in his usual style, as follows: "The case did not occur in the Summer; the date is patent to any one who will look for it." Cotton Mather says that she "first found herself to be formally besieged by the spectres," on the tenth of September. From the preceding clauses of the same paragraph, it might be inferred that she had had fits before. He speaks of those, on the tenth, as "the first I'll mention." The word "formally," too, almost implies the same. This, however, must be allowed to be the smallest kind of criticism, although uttered by the Reviewer in the style of a petulant pedagogue. If Summer is not allowed to borrow a little of September, it will sometimes not have much to show, in our climate. The tenth of September is, after all, fairly within the astronomical Summer.

The Reviewer says it will be "difficult for me to prove" that Margaret Rule belonged to Mr. Mather's Congregation, before September, 1693. Mather vindicates his taking such an interest in her case, on the ground that she was one of his "poor flock." The Reviewer raises a question on this point; and his controversy is with Mather, not with me. If Rule did not belong to the Congregation of North Boston, when Mather first visited her, his language is deceptive, and his apology, for meddling with the case, founded in falsehood. I make no such charge, and have no such belief. The Reviewer seems to have been led to place Cotton Mather in his own light—in fact, to falsify his language—on this point, by what is said of another Minister's having visited her, to whose flock she belonged, and whom she called, "Father." This was Increase Mather. We know he visited her; and it was as proper for him to do so, as for Cotton. They were associate Ministers of the same Congregation—that to which the girl belonged—and it was natural that she should have distinguished the elder, by calling him "Father."

In contradiction of another of my statements, the Reviewer says: "Mr. Mather did not publish an account of the long-continued fastings, or any other account of the case of Margaret Rule." He seems to think that "published" means "printed." It does not necessarily mean, and is not defined as exclusively meaning, to put to press. To be "published," a document does not need, now, to be printed. Much less then. Mather wrote it, as he says, with a view to its being printed, and put it into open and free circulation. Calef publicly declared that he received it from "a gentleman, who had it of the author, and communicated it to use, with his express consent." Mather says, in a prefatory note: "I now lay before you a very entertaining story," "of one who been prodigiously handled by the evil Angels." "I do not write it with a design of throwing it presently into the press, but only to preserve the memory of such memorable things, the forgetting whereof would neither be pleasing to God, nor useful to men." The unrestricted circulation of a work of this kind, with such a design, was publishing it. It was the form in which almost every thing was published in those days. If Calef had omitted it, in a book professing to give a true and full account of his dealings with Mather, in the Margaret Rule case, he would have been charged with having withheld Mather's carefully prepared view of that case. Mather himself considered the circulation of his "account," as a publication, for in speaking of his design of ultimately printing it himself, he calls it a "farther publication."

PART II. embraces the correspondence between Calef, Mather, and others, which I have particularly described.

PART III. is a brief account of the Parish troubles, at Salem Village.

PART IV. is a correspondence between Calef and a gentleman, whose name is not given, on the subject of witchcraft, the latter maintaining the views then prevalent.

PART V. is An impartial account of the most memorable matters of fact, touching the supposed witchcraft in New England, including the "Report" of the Trials given by Mather in his Wonders of the Invisible World.

The work is prefaced by an Epistle to the Reader, couched in plain but pungent language, in which he says: "It is a great pity that the matters of fact, and indeed the whole, had not been done by some abler hand, better accomplished, and with the advantages of both natural and acquired judgment; but, others not appearing, I have enforced myself to do what is done. My other occasions will not admit any further scrutiny therein." A Postscript contains some strictures on the Life of Sir Wm. Phips, then recently printed, "which book," Calef says, "though it bear not the author's name, yet the style, manner, and matter are such, that, were there no other demonstration or token to know him by, it were no witchcraft to determine that Mr. Cotton Mather is the author of it." The real agency of Sir William Phips, in demolishing, with one stern blow, the Court of Oyer and Terminer, and treading out the witchcraft prosecutions, has never, until recently, been known. The Records of the Council, of that time, were obtained from England, not long since. They, with the General Court Records, Phips's letter to the Home Government—copied in this article—and the Diary of Judge Sewall, reveal to us the action of the brave Governor, and show how much that generation and subsequent times are indebted to him, for stopping, what, if he had allowed it to go on, would have come, no man can tell "where at last."

Calef speaks of Sir William, kindly: "It is not doubted but that he aimed at the good of the people; and great pity it is that his Government was so sullied (for want of better information and advice from those whose duty it was to have given it) by the hobgoblin Monster, Witchcraft, whereby this country was nightmared and harassed, at such a rate as is not easily imagined."

Such were the contents, and such the tone, of Calef's book. The course he pursued, his carefulness to do right and to keep his position fortified as he advanced, and the deliberate courage with which he encountered the responsibilities, connected with his movement to rid the country of a baleful superstition, are worthy of grateful remembrance.

Mather received intelligence that Calef had sent his book to England, to be printed; and his mind was vehemently exercised in reference to it. He set apart the tenth of June, 1698, for a private Fast on the occasion; and he commenced the exercise of the day, by, "first of all, declaring unto the Lord" that he freely forgave Calef, and praying "the Lord also to forgive him." He "pleaded with the Lord," saying that the design of this man was to hurt his "precious opportunities of glorifying" his "glorious Lord Jesus Christ." He earnestly besought that those opportunities might not be "damnified" by Calef's book. And he finished by imploring deliverance from his calumnies. So "I put over my calumnious adversary into the hands of the righteous God."

On the fifth of November, Calef's book having been received in Boston, Mather again made it the occasion of Fasting and Praying. His friends also spent a day of prayer, as he expresses it, "to complain unto God," against Calef, he, Mather, meeting with them. On the twenty-fifth of November, he writes thus, in his Diary: "The Lord hath permitted Satan to raise an extraordinary Storm upon my father and myself. All the rage of Satan, against the holy churches of the Lord, falls upon us. First Calf's and then Colman's, do set the people into a mighty ferment."

The entries in his Diary, at this time, show that he was exasperated, to the highest degree, against Calef, to whom he applies such terms as, "a liar," "vile," "infamous," imputing to him diabolical wickedness. He speaks of him as "a weaver;" and, in a pointed manner calls him Calf, a mode of spelling his name sometimes practised, but then generally going out of use. The probability is that the vowel a, formerly, as in most words, had its broad sound, so that the pronunciation was scarcely perceptibly different, when used as a dissyllable or monosyllable. As the broad sound became disused, to a great extent, about this time, the name was spoken, as well as spelled, as a dissyllable, the vowel having its long sound. It was written, Calef, and thus printed, in the title-page of his book; so that Mather's variation of it was unjustifiable, and an unworthy taunt.

It is unnecessary to say that a fling at a person's previous occupation, or that of his parents—an attempt to discredit him, in consequence of his having, at some period of his life, been a mechanic or manufacturer—or dropping, or altering a letter in his name, does not amount to much, as an impeachment of his character and credibility, as a man or an author. Hard words, too, in a heated controversy, are of no account whatever. In this case, particularly, it was a vain and empty charge, for Mather to call Calef a liar. In the matter of the account, the latter drew up, of what took place in the chamber of Margaret Rule: as he sent it to Mather for correction, and as Mather specified some items which he deemed erroneous, his declaration that all the rest was a tissue of falsehoods, was utterly futile; and can only be taken as an unmeaning and ineffectual expression of temper. So far as the truthfulness of Calef's statements, generally, is regarded, there is no room left for question.

In his Diary for February, 1700, Mather says, speaking of the "calumnies that Satan, by his instrument, Calf, had cast upon" him and his father, "the Lord put it into the hearts of a considerable number of our flock, who are, in their temporal condition, more equal unto our adversary, to appear in our vindication." A Committee of seven, including John Goodwin, was appointed for this purpose. They called upon their Pastors to furnish them with materials; which they both did. The Committee drew up, as Mather informs us, in his Diary, a "handsome answer unto the slanders and libels of our slanderous adversary," which was forthwith printed, with the names of the members of the Committee signed to it. The pamphlet was entitled, Some Few Remarks, &c. Mather says of it: "The Lord blesses it, for the illumination of his people in many points of our endeavour to serve them, whereof they had been ignorant; and there is also set before all the Churches a very laudable example of a people appearing to vindicate their injured Pastors, when a storm of persecution is raised against them."

This vindication is mainly devoted to the case of the Goodwin children, twelve years before, and to a defence of the course of Increase Mather, in England, in reference to the Old and New Charters. No serious attempt was made to controvert material points in Calef's book, relating to Salem Witchcraft. As it would have been perfectly easy, by certificates without number, to have exposed any error, touching that matter, and as no attempt of the kind was made, on this or any other occasion, the only alternative left is to accept Hutchinson's conviction, that "Calef was a fair relator" of that passage in our history.

His book has, therefore, come down to us, bearing the ineffaceable stamp of truth.

It was so regarded, at the time, in England, as shown in the manner in which it was referred to by Francis Hutchinson and Daniel Neal; and in America, in the way in which Thomas Hutchinson speaks of Calef, and alludes to matters as stated by him. I present, entire, the judgment of Dr. John Eliot, as given in his Biographical Dictionary. Bearing in mind that Eliot's work was published in 1806, the reader is left to make his own comments on the statement, in the North American Review, that I originated, in 1831, the unfavorable estimate of Cotton Mather's agency in the witchcraft delusion of 1692. It is safe to say that no higher authority can be cited than that of John Eliot: "CALEF, ROBERT, merchant, in the town of Boston, rendered himself famous by his book against Witchcraft, when the people of Massachusetts were under the most strange kind of delusion. The nature of this crime, so opposite to all common sense, has been said to exempt the accusers from observing the rules of common sense. This was evident from the trials of witches, at Salem, in 1692. Mr. Calef opposed facts, in the simple garb of truth, to fanciful representations; yet he offended men of the greatest learning and influence. He was obliged to enter into a controversy, which he managed with great boldness and address. His letters and defence were printed, in a volume, in London, in 1700. Dr. Increase Mather was then President of Harvard College; he ordered the wicked book to be burnt in the College yard; and the members of the Old North Church published a defence of their Pastors, the Rev. Increase and Cotton Mather. The pamphlet, printed on this occasion, has this title-page: Remarks upon a scandalous book, against the Government and Ministry of New England, written by Robert Calef, &c. Their motto was, Truth will come off conqueror, which proved a satire upon themselves, because Calef obtained a complete triumph. The Judges of the Court and the Jury confessed their errors; the people were astonished at their own delusion; reason and common sense were evidently on Calef's side; and even the present generation read his book with mingled sentiments of pleasure and admiration."