feb 12, 1663 - Cotton Mather

Description:

Cotton Mather FRS was a New England Puritan clergyman and a prolific writer. In 1685 he joined his father, Increase Mather as minister of the Congregationalist Old North Meeting House of Boston, where he continued to preach for the rest of his life.

Born: February 12, 1663, Boston, MA
Died: February 13, 1728 (aged 65)
Boston, Province of Massachusetts Bay
Resting place: Copp's Hill Burying Ground, Boston
Education: Harvard College (AB, 1678; MA, 1681)
Occupation: Minister, writer

Spouses:
Lydia George (m. 1715–1728)
Elizabeth Hubbard (m. 1703–1713)
Abigail Philips (m. 1686–1702)

Siblings:
Sarah Walter
Nathaniel Mather
Elizabeth Byles
Maria Fifield
Jerusha Olive
Samule Mather
Abigale White
Hannah Oliver
Catherine Mather

Children:
Samuel Mather
Abigail Mather

Parents:
Increase Mather and Maria Cotton

Pre-trials
In 1689, Mather published Memorable Providences detailing the supposed afflictions of several children in the Goodwin family in Boston. Mather had a prominent role in the witchcraft case against Catholic washerwoman Goody Glover, which ultimately resulted in her conviction and execution. Besides praying for the children, which also included fasting and meditation, he would also observe and record their activities. The children were subject to hysterical fits, which he detailed in Memorable Providences. In his book, Mather argued that since there are witches and devils, there are "immortal souls." He also claimed that witches appear spectrally as themselves. He opposed any natural explanations for the fits; he believed that people who confessed to using witchcraft were sane; he warned against performing magic due to its connection with the devil.

Robert Calef was a contemporary of Mather and critical of him, and he considered this book responsible for laying the groundwork for the Salem witch trials three years later:

Cotton was the most active and forward of any Minister in the Country in those matters, taking home one of the Children, and managing such intrigues with that Child, and after printing such an account of the whole, in his Memorable Providences, as conduced much to the kindling of those Flames, that in Sir Williams time threatened the devouring of this Country.

Nineteenth-century historian Charles Wentworth Upham shared the view that the afflicted in Salem were imitating the Goodwin children, but he put the blame on both Cotton and his father Increase Mather:

They are answerable… more than almost any other men have been, for the opinions of their time. It was, indeed a superstitious age; but made much more so by their operations, influence, and writings, beginning with Increase Mather's movement, at the assembly of Ministers, in 1681, and ending with Cotton Mather's dealings with the Goodwin children, and the account thereof which he printed and circulated far and wide. For this reason, then in the first place, I hold those two men responsible for what is called 'Salem Witchcraft'

The court of Oyer and Terminer

In 1692, Cotton Mather claimed to have been industrious and influential in the direction of things at Salem from the beginning, but it remains unknown how much of a role he had in the formation or construction of the Court of Oyer and Terminer at the end of May or what the original intent for this court may have been.

Sir William Phips, governor of the newly chartered Province of Massachusetts Bay, signed an order forming the new court and allowed his lieutenant governor, William Stoughton, to become the court's chief justice. According to George Bancroft, Mather had been influential in gaining the politically unpopular Stoughton his appointment as lieutenant governor under Phips through the intervention of Mather's own politically powerful father, Increase. "Intercession had been made by Cotton Mather for the advancement of Stoughton, a man of cold affections, proud, self-willed and covetous of distinction."

The use of so-called "spectral evidence"

The afflicted girls claimed that the semblance of a defendant, invisible to any but themselves, was tormenting them; it was greatly contested whether this should be considered evidence, but for the Court of Oyer and Terminer decided to allow it, despite the defendant's denial and profession of strongly held Christian beliefs. In his May 31, 1692 essay to the judges, Mather expressed his support of the prosecutions, but also included some words of caution; "do not lay more stress on pure spectral evidence than it will bear … It is very certain that the Devils have sometimes represented the shapes of persons not only innocent, but also very virtuous. Though I believe that the just God then ordinarily provides a way for the speedy vindication of the persons thus abused."

Pushing forward the August 19 executions

On August 19, 1692, Mather attended the execution of George Burroughs[b] (and four others who were executed after Mather spoke) and Robert Calef presents him as playing a direct and influential role:

"Mr. Buroughs [sic] was carried in a Cart with others, through the streets of Salem, to Execution. When he was upon the Ladder, he made a speech for the clearing of his Innocency, with such Solemn and Serious Expressions as were to the Admiration of all present; his Prayer (which he concluded by repeating the Lord's Prayer) [as witches were not supposed to be able to recite] was so well worded, and uttered with such composedness as such fervency of spirit, as was very Affecting, and drew Tears from many, so that it seemed to some that the spectators would hinder the execution. The accusers said the black Man [Devil] stood and dictated to him. As soon as he was turned off [hanged], Mr. Cotton Mather, being mounted upon a Horse, addressed himself to the People, partly to declare that he [Mr. Burroughs] was no ordained Minister, partly to possess the People of his guilt, saying that the devil often had been transformed into the Angel of Light. And this did somewhat appease the People, and the Executions went on; when he [Mr. Burroughs] was cut down, he was dragged by a Halter to a Hole, or Grave, between the Rocks, about two feet deep; his Shirt and Breeches being pulled off, and an old pair of Trousers of one Executed put on his lower parts: he was so put in, together with [John] Willard and [Martha] Carrier, that one of his Hands, and his Chin, and a Foot of one of them, was left uncovered."

Letter from Cotton Mather to Judge William Stoughton, September 2, 1692

On September 2, 1692, after eleven of the accused had been executed, Cotton Mather wrote a letter to Chief Justice William Stoughton congratulating him on "extinguishing of as wonderful a piece of devilism as has been seen in the world" and claiming that "one half of my endeavors to serve you have not been told or seen."

Regarding spectral evidence, Upham concludes that "Cotton Mather never in any public writing 'denounced the admission' of it, never advised its absolute exclusion; but on the contrary recognized it as a ground of 'presumption' … [and once admitted] nothing could stand against it. Character, reason, common sense, were swept away." In a letter to an English clergyman in 1692, Boston intellectual Thomas Brattle, criticizing the trials, said of the judges' use of spectral evidence:

"The S.G. [Salem Gentlemen] will by no means allow, that any are brought in guilty, and condemned, by virtue of spectre Evidence... but whether it is not purely by virtue of these spectre evidences, that these persons are found guilty, (considering what before has been said,) I leave you, and any man of sense, to judge and determine."

The later exclusion of spectral evidence from trials by Governor Phips, around the same time his own wife's (Lady Mary Phips) name coincidentally started being bandied about in connection with witchcraft, began in January 1693. This immediately brought about a sharp decrease in convictions. Due to a reprieve by Phips, there were no further executions. Phips's actions were vigorously opposed by William Stoughton.

Bancroft notes that Mather considered witches "among the poor, and vile, and ragged beggars upon Earth", and Bancroft asserts that Mather considered the people against the witch trials to be witch advocates.

Oct. 20th, 1692 CM letter to his uncle, Mather did not sign his name or support his father's book initially:

"There are fourteen worthy ministers that have newly set their hands unto a book now in the press, containing Cases of Conscience about Witchcraft. I did, in my Conscience think, that as the humors of this people now run, such a discourse going alone would not only enable the witch-advocates, very learnedly to cavil and nibble at the late proceedings against the witches, considered in parcels, while things as they lay in bulk, with their whole dependencies, were not exposed; but also everlastingly stifle any further proceedings of justice & more than so produce a public & open contest with the judges who would (tho beyond the intention of the worthy author & subscribers) find themselves brought unto the bar before the rashest mobile [mob]"

— October 20, 1692 letter to his uncle John Cotton:

"The last major events in Mather's involvement with witchcraft were his interactions with Mercy Short in December 1692 and Margaret Rule in September 1693.[38] The latter brought a five year campaign by Boston merchant Robert Calef against the influential and powerful Mathers.[39] Calef's book More Wonders of the Invisible World was inspired by the fear that Mather would succeed in once again stirring up new witchcraft trials, and the need to bear witness to the horrible experiences of 1692. He quotes the public apologies of the men on the jury and one of the judges. Increase Mather was said to have publicly burned Calef's book in Harvard Yard around the time he was removed from the head of the college and replaced by Samuel Willard."

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