The phases in which the writings of Cotton Mather present their author are so varied, and the estimation in which he has been held by subsequent writers is so diverse, that there is difficulty in characterizing him to one’s own satisfaction. He was neither wholly saint, nor wholly sinner; was not unmingled wisdom, nor all folly. We do not very eagerly undertake to outline his character. But since, apart from records of courts, his pen furnished more valuable and more numerous facts pertaining to New England witchcraft in the seventeenth century than have come down from any other pen, there seems to be a call upon us to comment upon his competency and trustworthiness as observer and as reporter or recorder of facts.

In matured life he had become probably the first scholar and most learned man in the province. His mind was bright, versatile, and active, and its application to books, to the demands of his profession, and to the educational, moral, religious, and political interests of the public, was untiring. His attention was drawn to consideration of marvelous occurrences while he was quite young, and his records of witchcraft were nearly all penned by the time he was thirty years old. In 1689, being then only twenty-six, he published a small work entitled “Memorable Providences relating to Witchcraft and Possessions.”

He was a personal witness and an alert observer, through several successive months, of a rapid and prolonged stream of marvels, which were manifested through the children of John Goodwin, of Boston, in 1688, a long account of which he published quite soon after their occurrence. Four years later came on the Salem Witchcraft, and portions of its tragic and agonizing occurrences were witnessed by this Boston clergyman. He was present in the crowd around the gallows when several of the wronged victims to diabolism were executed. And he promptly furnished an extended account of much which had just intensely agitated and frenzied not only Salem and Essex County, but the whole province. The next year, 1693, brought him opportunity to be much with and to observe carefully two afflicted young, women in Boston, Mercy Short and Margaret Rule, whose maladies were deemed bewitchments. He recorded his observations and doings relating to these two persons, and his accounts are available to-day, though there is evidence rendering it probable that he never prepared either record for the press, and that both have become public without his sanction.

As has been learned from what precedes, Robert Calef, an opponent of some then prevalent beliefs and practices concerning witchcraft, found means, whether honorably or not is perhaps debatable, for putting Mather’s account of Margaret Rule before the world. This young woman was under Mather’s special watch for several weeks, while she was being acted upon by occult agents and forces; and he promptly recorded for perusal by his friends an account of what transpired around her.

From the foregoing statements it is obvious that, both directly and indirectly, very many facts and opinions, that will be adduced as our work proceeds, will have been derived from Mather’s records, and will rest, at least in part, upon his authority. Consequently, his qualifications, as observer, reporter, and recorder, are matters not only of interest, but of some importance.

Though young when attentive to witchcraft scenes, Mather was learned and influential. Probably few other persons, if any, in the colonies were then his equals in those respects. His duties as a clergyman and a citizen, and his inclination also, led him to be an extensive observer of marvelous manifestations; he obviously was a lover of such. And his records show that he was either a closer observer of the minutiÆ of transpiring events of that nature, or a more willing and careful specifier of little things pertaining to them, full of important meaning to some readers now, yet probably meaningless to many others, than were most of his cotemporaries; though Lawson, Hale, and Willard were good at specification, and were more cautious commentators than Mather. An ignoring of any participation by spirits in witchcraft scenes has blinded historians in both the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to some decided merits in the writings of Mather.The assumption by later commentators that no occurrences whatsoever, which required more than mortal agency for their production, ever actually transpired in cases witnessed and described by Mather, has apparently caused them, consciously or otherwise, to impute to his fancy, credulity, or other untrustworthy attributes, many things which a moderate acquaintance on their part with modern manipulations of occult forces by invisible intelligences would have suggested to them that possibly, and even probably, his statements of facts were based on positive observations by his own physical senses, and by the external senses of other observers. A class of agents are now at work whose cognition may some day turn the laugh upon overweeningly wise laughers at Cotton Mather. This circumscribed view as to the actual extent and variety of natural intelligent agents, and natural laws and forces, has caused them to draw inferences disparaging to Mather’s accuracy in places where more knowledge of the outworkings of laws and forces which spirits obey and use, would have given them trust in the essential naturalness and consequent probable occurrence of nearly or quite all the facts stated in his narrative of personal observations and experiences—we do not say in the pervading wisdom and value of his comments and inferences, but in the naturalness and consequent credibility of his facts.

Where forlorn and wretched old women, together with tricksy and roguish girls, and a few low-lived, malicious mortals of both sexes are regarded as the actual authors of all witchcraft phenomena, Mather’s reports of that class of occurrences are an offense—are a stumbling-block in the pathway of satisfactory solution. So long as his statements are left unimpeached, such agents as witchcraft has of late been imputed to are incompetent to the work ascribed to them. That author, therefore, must needs be discredited; consequently sneer, and slur, and ridicule have been brought to bear against his accuracy and trustworthiness. Some modern commentators have made savage use of such weapons upon this original describer of witchcraft scenes. He has been by innuendoes caricatured and metamorphosed to an extent which seems distinctly reprehensible. Brightest minds may sometimes lack knowledge of some existing agents and forces; good men may be actual, though unintentional perpetrators of great wrong, when they depict the characters of some predecessors whose words seem extravagant to such as limit natural actors and forces to those which the external senses and human science have long been familiar with.

Our recent readings have led us to regard Mather as a man of more than common efficiency in acquiring information, and more than common despatch in putting his acquisitions before the public. We find evidences in his works that, if he did not acquire, he put forth both more minute and more extensive knowledge of the marvelous phenomena of his times, than any other person then living in America of whom we have knowledge. Portions of his creeds helped him to frankness in description of marvels. His faith embraced many unseen intelligent agents, both good and bad, moving to and fro among men, ever walking the earth and influencing its affairs both “when we wake and when we sleep.” Consequently he never had occasion to inquire whether anything whatsoever was possible which his senses or the senses of other witnesses seemed to cognize. He doubted not that unseen powers competent to anything whatsoever were around both him and all other human beings. His only question was, did the thing occur? If it did, it was proper to describe it as it appeared to its beholders. How it could occur was a question which he, as recorder, was not called upon to answer; and he did not permit it to modify his record. This weakness(?) of his was fraught with latent strength which becomes beneficent in our day by its revealing to us the former mysterious irruption upon society of precisely such outrÉ and seemingly unnatural antics and doings, not only of animated human forms, but of lifeless household utensils and ornaments, as we are witnessing. History by him repeats itself to-day, and to-day’s marvels give credibility to his statements. Mather furnished broader and better bases for judging of the real sources, nature, character, and extent of witchcraft facts, than we generally get from other persons of his day. Over-cautious witnesses and reporters often mislead very widely by failing to tell “the whole truth.”

Some of Mather’s statements and doings which were slurred even by his cotemporary Calef, and have been by later writers also, may deserve more respectful consideration than has usually been accorded to them. We are alluding to his manipulations of the afflicted, and other like acts. These indicate that either his observances and care of bewitched persons, or his intuitions, were giving him hints of the existence of natural laws and special conditions which permit mortals to loose, what he conceived to be,—or at least spoke of as being,—the devil’s hold upon human instruments. We apprehend that he had at least vague surmises that some things which we now call mesmeric passes and psychological forces might be so applied by himself as to thwart the purposes and powers of possessing spirits. We are ready to grant that his use of dawning knowledge or of inflowed suggestions, whichever of them it was that set his own hands in motion over the obsessed, and prompted him to influence others to do the like, produced movements so unskillful that they were seldom very efficacious; yet we perceive that he moved in direction toward later discoveries which at this day enable many mortals to exercise much power toward both inducing and abolishing the control of human beings by disembodied spirits. There hang about Mather slight indications that he received some knowledge or some impulses, mediumistically, impressionally, or intuitively. The fact that, though having much to do with both Mercy Short and Margaret Rule during the months of their affliction in the year immediately following the executions at Salem, he refrained from advising or procuring their prosecution, or the prosecution of any whom they named as their afflictors, the facts that prayers, fastings, manipulations, and protracted and unflagging kindnesses and attentions, were his only appliances, and that both the girls were brought back to their normal condition, speak very distinctly in favor of Mather’s sagacity and philanthropy, in relation to the bewitched and the bewitchers, that year.Though we are disposed to credit this prominent man with all the merits to which he has fair claim, we are far from regarding him as without foibles, weaknesses, and traits fitted to mantle the reader’s face with smiles. We dissent from many of his notions, practices, and beliefs; we find him often swayed by motives which we are not ready to commend. At the same time we apprehend that many modern critics have paraded his weaknesses, blemishes, and laughable traits out of all just proportion to the notices, if any, which they have taken of his genuine merits.

Mather obviously was vain, egotistical, proud of his descent, greedy of the favor of great men both of the province and abroad, and was ambitious of place and influence. But vanity and egotism are not necessarily incompatible with very extensive learning, nor with great activity and beneficence, nor with presentation of facts and truths both very fully and without over-statement or distortion. He wrote hastily—much too hastily, and loosely oftentimes. More care to verify information and statements furnished him by other people, and more careful expressions pertaining to his own observations, experiences, and opinions, would have rendered him a much more valuable historian than he became. We concede that he was a loose and immethodical writer; but we fail to find evidence that he often, if ever, substituted fictions for facts, or made false statements or great exaggerations. The world is indebted to him for preserving and transmitting much valuable information.

This man’s estimation of himself and of his ancestry often reveals itself in extent and manner which provoke smiles. Possibly his egotism was competent to give him a latent notion that quite as much favor might be vouchsafed by powers above to his two eminent grandfathers, Revs. Richard Mather and John Cotton, to his father, Rev. Increase Mather, President of Harvard College, and to himself, as Heaven had in store for any mortals; and if any one of the four should be the special favorite of supernal intelligence, why not himself, in whom the blood of the other three was combined? If any quite honorable Public position was devoid of an incumbent, or if important literary public service was needed, who was more competent to fill the one, or to the performance of the other, than himself? He wrote both for and of Sir William Phips, but was not chosen President, of Harvard College.

Even egregious egotism is not necessarily incongruous with truth, kindness, charity, devotion, and great usefulness. With all his faults, we regard Mather, when compared with most men, as having been very efficient, well-intentioned, and useful to the community around him. Propensity to magnify self and whatever self either puts forth or is closely allied to, may be prevailingly bridled and controlled by other strong inclinations, and kept within the boundaries of truth. Greed for approbation and commendation by persons holding high official position, and by all others whose characters, attainments, or possessions gave them influence in society, was apparently very strong in Cotton Mather, and the influence of that greed must generally have swayed him to make no important statements which would fail to meet, with general credence by his friends and fellow-townsmen. His account of the Goodwin family is as full of things hard to be believed as any other portion of his writings; and yet, if he therein permitted himself to make any other than such statements as would receive ready credence by many physicians, clergymen, magistrates, and other influential and truthful persons who had been his fellow-witnesses, and knew exactly the bounds beyond which he could not go on a basis of well-observed facts, he would diminish his fame and favor with the public; and he well knew this. He was not the man to thus put his own reputation at hazard. His very weaknesses render it probable that he has transmitted little, if anything, more relating to that family than Boston, as a whole, was at that time actually believing had just occurred in its midst. It is not wise, not kind, not just to overlook such characteristics and circumstances pertaining to a narrator as would naturally hold his speech within the bounds of credibility. Mather’s style and manner, sometimes admirable, are very often laughable, and are generally loose and unattractive. But these matters of taste and polish are distinct from his facts and truthfulness.

Bad manners, lack of tact, also speech, acts, and omissions unbecoming the gentleman and the divine, mark portions of Mather’s treatment of Calef. Whether such were his general characteristics, we do not know; probably they were not. Occupation of the pulpit, as we know by personal experience, may make a preacher exceedingly sensitive to questionings of his opinions on any important matters anywhere. His habit of speaking, week after week, year after year, where none question or controvert, induces extreme sensitiveness in the mental cuticle. If sick and overworked, Mather may have been easily nettled into other than his usual manners when Calef pricked him by opposing his beliefs, and by covert sneers at some of his actions. In his account of Mercy Short he mentions his impaired health and overworkings.

Unfortunately, as we judge, for his posthumous reputation, Mather was scribe of a convention of clergymen who met and deliberately put forth advice to the courts and government pertaining to evidence and processes which might properly be used at trials for the crime of witchcraft. As scribe, Mather reduced the opinions of the convention to form for publication, if he had not previously drawn up his own, and at the meeting obtained their adoption. Since the advice of this convention has been extensively regarded as disastrous in its results, Mather has been deemed an efficient, if not the most efficient of all promoters of the executions at Salem. We seriously question the justice of such imputation upon him, and we doubt whether the advice of the convention incited to the special course of action pursued by the courts, though it partially permitted it, perhaps. That advice commended “a very critical and exquisite caution ... 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.” So far, good. This, to us at this day, looks like a caution to avoid the admission of spectral evidence, as it was then called, and distinct statement is made that such evidence alone was not enough to justify conviction; also it looks like a caution against cruel methods of extorting pleas and confessions. But the concluding paragraph of their advice, which is in the following words, may have greatly nullified the softening force of all that preceded it. “We cannot but humbly recommend unto the government the speedy and vigorous prosecution of such as have rendered themselves obnoxious, according to the directions given in the laws of God and wholesome statutes of the English nation, for the detection of witchcraft.” This advice came forth June 15, 1692, just when the flames of witchcraft at Salem village had become alarming to the whole community; when scores of people were under arrest there upon suspicion of witchcraft, and when the courts were anxiously seeking to know how to conduct their trials. The advice seems to us somewhat ambidexter, holding forth in one hand exhortations to caution and leniency, and in the other an exhortation to make vigorous and prompt application of English witchcraft laws and usages which permitted and implied resort to most barbarous processes, and admitted all imaginable sorts of evidence. The general impression upon our mind, made by our recent readings, is, that the clergy generally were opposed to much reliance upon spectral evidence, and that their advice was meant to give that impression; while the civil magistrates at Salem held a different opinion, acted according to it, and obtained convictions upon spectral evidence in cases where none other was attainable. It was the civil magistrates, much more than the clergy, whose opinions, when embodied in action, outwrought the horrors of Gallows Hill. Therefore we attach less blame to the scribe of the convention, and to the convention itself, than many others have done.

Though the belief is wide-spread in the youthful mind of our day that Cotton Mather was chief begetter of Salem witchcraft, we find no facts to justify belief that any act of his ever had such intent. His chief acts known to us which connect him at all with doings there, were his authorship of the clerical advice just noticed, his presence at the hanging when Proctor, Willard, Burroughs, and others were executed, when he said aloud to the multitude which was being incited by a fervent and touching address from the lips of the doomed Burroughs, “Even the devil may be changed into an angel of light,” and his offer to support five or six of the afflicted at his own expense for weeks, provided he should be allowed to treat them by his own preferred process—that of praying and fasting, and keeping them mostly secluded from public observation.

Unexplained, his presence at the execution may be supposed to argue that it was one which had attractions for him—one which it was his pleasure to be present at. But a very rational supposition of Poole places Mather before us there in a different light. Proctor and others had been hardly dealt with by the clergy in and near Salem, and, while confined in Boston jail awaiting the day of execution, they received such attentions from Mather, that they requested him to be present as their spiritual adviser at the closing hour of their earthly lives. Statements by Mather, which his cotemporaries never contradicted, are to the effect that he never attended any trial for witchcraft, that no one was ever prosecuted for that crime by him, or at his suggestion, or by his advice; that his voice and intentional influence were ever against such proceedings. He also informs us that he made an offer to support five or six of the Salem sufferers for weeks at his own expense, if he could have them subjected to his special charge, so that he could treat them by methods of his own. Such facts surely indicate that an ardent and active man like him, ever burning to take part in most popular movements, was not in sympathy with originators of the violent and barbarous proceedings which were prosecuted at Salem. Had he relished them he would have been present at the trials. The facts give spontaneous birth to a presumption that some other motive than curiosity to witness the executions took him to Salem at the time when we find him there, and the supposition of Poole that he went there as the comforter and friend of Proctor and Willard is reasonable, and probably correct. If it be, the motive of his visit was not only commendable, but was also in harmony with his general doings in witchcraft cases that were more specially under his supervision, and is in distinct antagonism with motives which have been extensively imputed to him. We apprehend, however, that when others obtained convictions and sentences for witchcraft, he favored the execution of what he deemed wholesome law.

We regret that he rudely broke the spell which the hallowing speech and prayer of the saintly Burroughs were bringing upon the witnessing crowd. But we question whether the special reputed crime for which Burroughs was about to die, caused Mather to allude to him as the devil. Burroughs, though a preacher, had not been regularly ordained, or surely not in a way that satisfied Mather; also he was too regardless of the ordinances of religion, and too free a thinker, to suit the taste of the pastor of the North Church in Boston. This was, we think, his great offense in Mather’s view; and this caused the latter to say in reference to one who may have been more God-like and Christ-like in spirit than himself, “Even the devil may be changed into an angel of light.” That saying, under its circumstances, is damaging to Mather; yet it does not bear against him in matters pertaining to witchcraft, but to those of sectarianism or bigotry.

Mather the humane and Mather the fame-seeker present very different aspects in their connections with witchcraft. As we view him in cases where he was leader and director, as those of Mercy Short and Margaret Rule, matters were so managed that no one was brought to examination upon suspicion of bewitching them, and Mather’s words and acts were uniformly designed to prevent any arraignment. Prayer, fastings, manipulations, and all practicable privacy and quiet were his preferred appliances for closing up the devil’s avenues of access, and of barring him off from man. This was Mather the humane, was Mather the practical pastor. But when the courts and men of influence and high position had applied, as they interpreted them, “the laws of God and the wholesome statutes of the English nation for the detection of witchcraft,” the thirster for public approbation, not only refrained from protest against bloodshed, but lacked modesty enough to hold him back from hinting that his own productions might have helped on the beneficent work which had been accomplished; for he carefully let the world know that Mr. Mather, the younger, drew up the advice of the ministers to the court; and after having written out an account of the trials at Salem, he said, “I shall rejoice that God is glorified, if the publication of these trials may promote such a pious thankfulness to God for justice being so far executed among us,” as the ministers piously expressed in their advice. This was Mather the fame-seeker, the ecclesiastic, and the subject of their Majesties, William and Mary. Mather was not a well-balanced man. Consistency all round was not conspicuous in him, yet he was consistent in his own treatment and management of all his special patients, and also in his efforts to make it known that himself might deserve some meed of merit for the murderous course pursued by the authorities for stopping the ravages of the evil one.

From early manhood to the close of his life, Mather was an unfaltering believer in Protestant Christendom’s great witchcraft devil, backed by countless hosts of lesser ones, and he also believed in her special witchcraft. He had full faith in a devil as ubiquitous, active, and malignant as his own vigorous and expansive intellect could conjure up; had faith that extra manifestations of afflictive might, of knowledge, or of suffering in the outer world were produced by the devil, and faith also that even that mighty evil one was unable to afflict men outwardly, excepting either at the call or by the aid of some human servant who had entered into a covenant with his Black Majesty. The woe-working points of this man’s faith were, that special covenantings with the devil were entered into by human beings, in consequence of which the covenanting mortals became witches—that is, they thence became able to command all his powers, as well as he theirs; also that only through such covenanted ones could he or his do harm to the bodies and external possessions of men. Therefore, he reasoned, that, whenever extra and unaccountable malignant action appeared, some covenanter with the devil must be in the neighborhood of the malignant manifestation.

And yet, practically, Mather was not disposed to let the public get knowledge of the covenanter. His choice was, to keep secret the names of bewitched actors, the afflictors of the suffering ones, and to strive by prayers, fastings, manipulations, &c., to relieve the unhappy sufferers. Had his policy been adopted by the public, had his example been widely followed, there would have been no execution for witchcraft in his generation.

We can—and we are glad that we can—state that Mather’s faith embraced some other invisible beings than malicious ones, who had access to man. In that respect he probably differed from, and was favored above, most of the clergy and church members of his times; and perhaps his possession of faith in the ministry of good angels made him a more lenient handler and more patient observer of the afflicted, than were most of his cotemporaries. His prolonged attention to Martha Goodwin, to Mercy Short, to Margaret Rule, and his offer to take care of five or six Salem ones if he could be allowed the management of them, bespeak kindness in him above what was common in his age toward those deemed to be under “an evil hand.” He once wrote thus:—

“In the present evil world it is no wonder that the evil angels are more sensible than those of the good ones. Nevertheless it is very certain that the good angels continually, without any defilement, fly about in our defiled atmosphere to minister for the good of them that are the heirs of salvation.... Now, though the angelic ministration is usually behind the curtain of more visible instruments and their actions, yet sometimes it hath been with extraordinary circumstances made more obvious to the sense of the faithful.”

He was not unmindful and did not omit to record the fact that “the enchanted people talked much of a white spirit, from whence they received marvelous assistances.... Margaret Rule had a frequent view of his bright, shining, and glorious garments, ... and says he told her that God had permitted her afflictions to befall her for the unspeakable and everlasting good of her own soul, and for the good of many others; and for his own immortal glory.”

When a being or beings of such glorious appearance present themselves, and when their utterances and influences are elevating and blissful, it is not wise to ignore them. The very laws which permit the advent of low and dark spirits are natural, and can be availed of, on fitting occasions and conditions, by elevated and bright ones; therefore wisdom invites man to solicit and prepare the way for visits by the latter class.The courtesy of S. F. Haven, Esq., the accomplished librarian of the American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Mass., recently permitted us to see a long-lost and recently discovered manuscript, giving, in Cotton Mather’s handwriting, an account of Mercy Short. We judge from cursory perusal of a modern manuscript copy of Mather’s account, that the librarian had ample grounds for reporting to the society that Mercy Short’s was “a case similar to that of Margaret Rule, but of greater interest and fuller details.” He further remarked in his report, that “it will be remembered that the account of Margaret Rule was not published by Mather himself, but by his enemy Calef, who by some means obtained possession of it. The story of Mercy Short, from an indorsement upon it, appears to have been privately circulated among his friends, but there is nothing to show that Mather ever intended it for publication.”—S. F. Haven’s Report, April 29, 1874.

Common fairness requires all modern critics to remember and regard the fact that Mather’s accounts of Mercy Short and Margaret Rule were never given to the public by himself; that they never received his revision and correction for the press. Because of this they perhaps come to us more alive with the spirit of frankness and sincerity, and with more detail of little incidents. Unstudied records are generally honest and substantially accurate, even if marred by looseness of style and expression, and by statements of wonders.

Our views would require us to refrain from calling Calef Mather’s “enemy,” as the librarian did. He was the enemy of unscriptural definitions of witchcraft, and of unjustifiable proceedings against those accused of it; but not, as we read his purposes and feelings, the enemy of Mather himself. He was the enemy of opinions of which Mather was a conspicuous and outspoken representative, and whose writings furnished provoking occasion for an attack upon disastrous errors.

We trust the public may ere long see Mather’s account of Mercy Short in print. That, and the one of Margaret Rule, show us very authentically, and we can almost say beautifully, the temper of Mather witch-ward, in the spring and autumn of the year next following the memorable 1692. Nothing then inclined him to ways that led to human slaughter. The conditions, seeming acts, and surroundings of those two girls apparently gave him opportunity and power to evoke a repetition of Salem’s fearful scenes, in which the modern world has been deluded to believe that his soul found pleasure. If that soul loved blood, it could easily have set it flowing in 1693, and found wherewith to gratify its appetite; but it did not.

One of the questions of great importance which received earnest discussion in witchcraft times, perhaps the most important of all in practical bearings, had Mather and Calef both on the same side, and consequently it was not dwelt upon in their controversy. Our reference is to the validity of “spectral evidence,”—that is, of testimony given by those who obviously perceived the facts they testified to while in an entranced, clairvoyant, or other abnormal condition. Some—many—able and good men then maintained that such testimony, unbacked by any other, might justify conviction of witchcraft, while quite as many, equally able and good men, including most of the clergy, maintained that such testimony alone was not sufficient.

Another disputed point was, whether Satan could assume the shape of an innocent person, and in that shape do mischief to the bodies and estates of mankind. The same question, partially, is up to-day—viz., Can any but willing devotees to Satan be used in the processes of spirit manifestations? Our two combatants were not at variance here—both had faith that Satan, the then synonym of Spirits, whether good or bad, could employ the innocent in prosecuting his purposes.

On the question whether Satan was obliged to use some mortal in covenant with himself whenever he harmed another mortal, they differed, as has been already shown, Mather claiming that human co-operation was frequently, if not always, needful to any manifestation of witchcraft. But in 1698 he put this among what he conceived to be “mistaken principles.” We do not recall any other point on which he expressed change of view, nor do we find him making confessions of personal wrong-doings in connection with witchcraft; neither does he seem to have had cause for either confession or repentance, if kindness, leniency, and good-will to man are not to be confessed and repented of as crimes.