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Updated: May 29, 2025
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.
I wonder this Reviewer did not tell the public, that I had never seen, read, or heard of Calef; for, to adopt his habit of reasoning, if I had been acquainted with that writer, my ignorance would have been enlightened, as Calef would have informed me that "the whole of the Minister's advice and answer is printed in Cases of Conscience, the last pages."
The expression used for the final act is, "turned off." There is no shadow of evidence to contradict Calef. The probabilities seem to be against the supposition of a structure, on a scale so large, as to allow room for eight persons to be turned off at once.
The girls, thinking they had got Mrs. Elizabeth Carey in prison, said no more about it. As Jonathan and his wife were safe, and beyond reach, the whole matter dropped out of the public mind; and Mrs. Elizabeth remained undisturbed. This is the only way in which I can account for the strange incongruity of the statements, as found in the "Complaint," Calef, and Hutchinson.
If a gentleman of his position and family, a grandson of an original Patentee, Sir Richard Saltonstall, and sitting as a Judge at the first trial, had the independence and manly spirit to express, without reserve, his disapprobation of the proceedings, the expression of Calef is explained; and the Court felt the obstacle that was in their way.
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.
Of course, he could not pray with, and could hardly be expected to pray for, them. The language ascribed to him by Calef, expressed his honest convictions; bears the stamp of credibility; was not denied or disavowed, then; and cannot be discredited, now.
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.
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.
The layman, who sits silent in his pew, has his rights when out of it, and among them is the right of questioning that which has been addressed to him from the privileged eminence of the pulpit, or in any way sanctioned by his religious teacher. So wrote Robert Calef, the Boston merchant, whose book the Reverend Increase Mather, president of Harvard College, burned publicly in the college yard.
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