The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1894-10-13
INTRODUCTION.
MARK /: 2I-34.

LIN lhOOOCIlON.
In Salem, Massachusetts,, in the win
ter of I6oI-2, company of nine girls, rang
ing from nine to twenty years OF age, met
several evenings at the house of the parish
minister, Rev. Mr.. Paris, to relieve the
tedium of their dull existence with PALMS
try, recromancy and ghost-stories. The
daughter of the parish minister was of the
company. All were under the tuition of
Mr.. Parriss slaves, John Indian, and
Johns wife Tituba, from the West Indies,
and well versed in Central American Jug
gleries and superstitions. Certain of the
girls, one evening, under their nervous
strain, fell into fits, or fidgets, or Mysteries.
On successive evenings the same thing oc-
cured. The parents came, not to rescue
and discipline these girls, but to marvel at
their swoons and contortions and gibber-
ish. Soon a convocation of neigboring
ministers was called to consider the case of
the afflicted girls. 1t was solemnly de-
clared that the girls were bewitchcd. In
this decision the medical fraternity, the
civil officials and almost the entire COM
munity conceded. 1t was regarded as an
established fact that these girls were tor
mented by witches. Who were these
witches, these demoniacs, these agents of
the devil? The testimony of the girls was
taken. They declared that certain women
of the neigilborhood rode to them through
the air on sticks, and pinched them and
pricked them with pins. The girls were
implicitly believed. Their alleged tormen-
tors were arrested. Tie charge against
them was witchcraft. Their guilt was re-
garded as beyond question. They were
offered the privilege of confessing their
guilt, and casting themselves on the for
bearance of Gods people; they were as
sured tAat denial of their guilt would incur
the penalty of death. Fifty-ive, under this
stress, affirmed themselves witches and
wizards. These escaped. Twenty main
tanned their innocence. No threats, no
tortures, could wiring from them a comics
sion of their guilt. They were martyrs TO
their own integrity On Witch Hell nine
teen were hung. Meanwhile blight fell
on the community. Ordinary business
was suspended. TIE sole employment of
magistrates and ministers was to Illustrate
the imagined Devil in his imagined on
slaught. The common mind was by turns
fevercd and appalled,. The mentally dis
ordered girls were all the while making
new charges. Reputable people were be-
ing constantly arrested. A clergyman in
good standing was hung for wizard.
More than three hundred people were I'M
der surveillance as suspects. What was to
be done? To whisper suspicion that the
testimony of the girls was not to be cred
tied, was to ensure speedy arrest as witch
or a wizard. What would be the end?
But, at last, common sense revived and
gained courage. The evidence of the hys-
teric girls was questioned. 1t was, under
cross-examination, riddled and dissipated.
The girls confessed their criminal decep-
tons. The timid who had, in fear of
the gaIlows, declared themselves witches
or wizards, were emboldened to maintain
that they had been coerced into false con-
LESSONS. Sanity at last returned to the
magistrates and the clergy. The prisons
were emptied of the suspects. The popu'
lar verdict against the twenty who had suf-
fered martyrdom, was, when too late, re-
versed. They were remembered as those
who, when living, loved truth more than
life. The name of "The Salem Witch
craft" was changed to "The Witchcraft
Delusion." -DemOniacal posses
sion, as believed in by the ancients, is
substantially identical with witchcraft. Is
there a single reason for believing demoni-
acal possession real, that is not an equally
good reason for believing witchcraft real!
Both must be classed among the things
which never exist save in the human mag
ination.