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Updated: May 20, 2025
And there were all the weird old stories she had read some of them in Cotton Mather's "Magnalia," and begged others from Miss Recompense, who did not quite know whether she believed them or not, but she said emphatically that people had been mistaken and there was no such thing as witches. "A whole week!" said Uncle Winthrop. "Whatever shall I do without a little girl that length of time?"
But worthless as Mather's statements are, in describing the views of the Quakers, they are valuable as indicating the temper in which these disturbers of the Puritan theocracy were regarded. In accusing them of rejecting the Bible and making a law unto themselves, Mather simply put on record a general belief which he shared.
Did Longfellow, after a critical study of the original evidence and records, truly interpret Mather's views, in his dialogue with Hathorne? MATHER: "Remember this, That as a sparrow falls not to the ground Without the will of God, so not a Devil Can come down from the air without his leave. We must inquire."
On the 28th of October the fellows met and chose John Leverett president of Harvard College; and then came a demonstration which proved not only Increase Mather's prescience, when he foretold how a liberal university would kill a disciplined church, but which shows the mighty influence a devoted teacher can have upon his age. Thirty-nine ministers addressed Governor Dudley thus:
Speaking of Mather's book, Doctor Hutchinson proceeds: "The judgment I made of it was, that the poor old woman, being an Irish Papist, and not ready in the signification of English words, had entangled herself by a superstitious belief, and doubtful answers about Saints and Charms; and seeing what advantages Mr.
The original title was "Benifacias," followed by ten lines of sub-titles. This was unusual reserve for one of Cotton Mather's productions. In its day it was as popular as is the worst novel of ours, and was continually being republished. Even Dr. Franklin read and praised it and professed that it had influenced his whole life.
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.
It was often his delight, after his school was dismissed in the afternoon, to stretch himself on the rich bed of clover bordering the little brook that whimpered by his school-house, and there con over old Mather's direful tales until the gathering dusk of the evening made the printed page a mere mist before his eyes.
And then Cotton Mather would go home to his secret chamber, and write in his diary that God and religion were perhaps, after all, but an old wives' tale. Parris, as soon as he comprehended Mather's drift, ably seconded him. He had his own grudges against his neighbors to work off, and nothing could be easier.
In concluding the considerations that render it probable that Cotton Mather had much to do with the Examinations, it may be said, in general, that he vindicates the course taken at them, in language that seems to identify himself with them, and to prove that he could not have been opposed to the methods used in them. I now proceed to examine Cotton Mather's connection with the Trials at Salem.
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