Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: June 14, 2025
When the first inquiry is made into the circumstances of such as may lie under the just suspicion of witchcrafts, we could wish that there may be admitted as little as possible of such noise, company and openness as may too hastily expose them that are examined, and that there may be nothing used as a test for the trial of the suspected, the lawfulness whereof may be doubted by the people of God, but that the directions given by such judicious writers as Perkins and Barnard may be observed.
The elders began the agitation by sending out a paper of proposals for collecting stories of apparitions and witchcrafts, and in obedience to their wish Increase Mather published his "Illustrious Providences" in 1683-4.
The husband said that these Changat-Jering devils were very bad ones. The pawan then exorcised the devil, and burned strong-smelling drugs under the woman's nose, after which he came out of her, and she fell asleep, the "wise man" receiving a fee. I never heard of any country of such universal belief in devils, familiars, omens, ghosts, sorceries, and witchcrafts.
And if he turn against the hyena, the beast is soon taken, as magicians tell. And also witches use the heart of this beast and the liver, in many witchcrafts.
Now, said she, you'll make us all alive again! And, without helping me, she ran away to the pond, and brought all the crew to the wood-house. The wicked woman, as she entered, said, Where is she? Plague of her spells, and her witchcrafts! O cruel creature! said I, if you knew what I have suffered, it would move you to pity me!
Autograph Letter of COTTON MATHER, on Witchcraft, presented to the Literary and Historical Society, by the Honorable Chief-justice SEWELL. 17^th 6^m, 1692. "S^r: "You would know whether I still retain my opinion about y^e horrible Witchcrafts among us, and I acknowledge that I do.
Certainly he was a physician of eminence. "We are noways doubtful," he wrote, "that there are witches, but have not always been satisfied in the application of their witchcrafts." So spoke the famous physician of Norwich. But a man whose opinion was of much more consequence was Sir Robert Boyle. Boyle was a chemist and "natural philosopher."
The dissatisfaction that pervaded the public mind, about the time of the last executions at Salem, which Phips describes, was so serious, that both the Mathers were called in to allay it. The father also, at the request of the Ministers, wrote a book, entitled, Cases of Conscience, concerning Evil Spirits, personating men, Witchcrafts, &c., the general drift of which is against spectral evidence.
If the farmers thereabouts were to be trusted, I knew Old Legion's bailiff would shortly be at hand, to distrain upon a soul escheat and forfeited to Dis by many years of cruel witchcrafts, close wiles, and nameless sorceries; and I could never abide unpared nails, even though they be red-hot.
In some of Cotton Mather's, the name, Devil, or its synonyms, is mentioned ten times as often as that of the benign and blessed God. No wonder that alleged witchcrafts were numerous! Drake, in his History of Boston, says there were many cases there, about the year 1688.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking