NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 15 



the Invisible World," thanking God for the triumphs over Satan 

 thus gained at Salem ; and his hook received the approbation of 

 the Governor of the Province, the President of Harvard College, 

 and various eminent theologians in Europe as well as in America. 



But, despite such efforts as these, observation, and thought 

 upon observation, which form the beginning of all true science, 

 began a new order of things. The people began to fall away. 

 Justice Bradstreet, having committed thirty or forty persons, be- 

 came aroused to the absurdity of the whole matter ; the minister 

 of Andover had the good sense to resist the theological view; 

 even so high a personage as Lady Phips, the wife of the Gov- 

 ernor, began to show lenity. 



Each of these was, in consequence of this disbelief, charged 

 with collusion with Satan ; but such charges seemed now to lose 

 their force. 



In the midst of all this delusion and terrorism stood Cotton 

 Mather firm as ever. His efforts to uphold the declining supersti- 

 tion were heroic. But he at last went one step too far. Being 

 himself possessed of a mania for myth-making and wonder-mon- 

 gering, and having described a case of witchcraft with possibly 

 greater exaggeration than usual, he was confronted by Robert 

 Calef. Calef was a Boston merchant, and appears to have united 

 the good sense of a man of business to considerable shrewdness in 

 observation, power in thought, and love for truth. He began 

 writing to Mather and others to show the weak points in the sys- 

 tem. Mather, indignant that a person so much his inferior dared 

 dissent from his opinion, at first affected to despise Calef ; but, as 

 Calef pressed him more and more closely, Mather denounced him, 

 calling him among other things " A Coal from Hell." All to no 

 purpose. Calef fastened still more firmly upon the flanks of the 

 great theologian ; thought and reason now began to resume their 

 sway. 



The possessed having accused certain men held in very high 

 respect, doubts began to dawn upon the community at large. 

 Here was the repetition of that which set men thinking under 

 similar circumstances in the German bishoprics when those under 

 trial for witchcraft there had at last, in their desperation or mad- 

 ness, charged the very bishops and the judges upon the bench with 

 sorcery. The party of reason grew stronger. The Rev. Mr. Par- 

 ris was soon put upon the defensive, for some of the possessed be- 

 gan to confess that they had accused people wrongfully. Hercu- 

 lean efforts were made by certain of the clergy and devout laity 

 to support the declining belief, but the more thoughtful turned 

 more and more against it; jurymen prominent in convictions 

 solemnly retracted their verdicts and publicly craved pardon of 

 God and man. Most striking of all was the case of Justice Sew- 



