io THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



theology, and adopting its most literal interpretation — it is not 

 strange that ideas regarding the darker side of nature were rap- 

 idly developed.* 



The fear of witchcraft, thus developed, received a powerful 

 stimulus from the treatises of learned men. Such works, coming 

 from Europe, which was at that time filled with the superstition, 

 acted powerfully upon conscientious preachers and were brought 

 by them to bear upon the people at large. Naturally, then, 

 throughout the latter half of the seventeenth century we find 

 scattered cases of diabolical possession. At Boston, Springfield, 

 Hartford, Groton, and other towns, cases occurred, and here and 

 there we hear of death-sentences. 



In the last quarter of the seventeenth century the fruit of 

 these ideas began to ripen. In the year 1684 Increase Mather pub- 

 lished his book, "Remarkable Providences," laying stress upon 

 diabolical possession and witchcraft. This book, having been sent 

 over to England, exercised an influence there and came back with 

 the approval of no less a man than Richard Baxter. By this its 

 power at home was increased. 



In 1688 a poor family in Boston was afflicted by demons. Four 

 children, the eldest thirteen years of age, began leaping and bark- 

 ing like dogs, or purring like cats, and complaining of being 

 pricked, pinched, and cut. An old Irishwoman was finally tried 

 and executed. 



All this produced a deep impression on the mind of a man of 

 great natural abilities, of most earnest and conscientious desire to 

 do good in his generation, mixed with pride, vanity, ambition, and 

 love of power ; in short, a typical specimen of the high ecclesias- 

 tic as he has so often afflicted the earth. This man was Cotton 

 Mather, the son of Increase Mather, and both father and son gave 

 all their great powers to deepening and extending this theologi- 

 cal view as sanctioned by Scripture. 



In 1692 began a new outbreak of possession, which is one of 

 the most instructive in history. The Rev. Samuel Parris was the 

 minister of the church in Salem. No pope ever had higher ideas 

 of his own infallibility, no bishop a greater love of ceremony, no 

 inquisitor a greater passion for prying and spying, f 



Before long Mr. Parris had much upon his hands. Many of 

 his hardy, independent parishioners disliked his ways. Quarrels 

 arose. Some of the leading men of the congregation were pitted 

 against him. The previous minister, George Burroughs, had left 

 the germs of troubles and quarrels, and to these were now added 



* For the idea that America before the Pilgrims had been especially given over to 

 Satan, see the literature of the early Puritan period, and especially the poetry of Wiggles- 

 worth, treated in Tyler's " History of American Literature," vol. ii, p. 25 el seq. 



f For curious examples of this, see Upham's " History of Salem Witchcraft," voL i. 



