latter on the scaffold
offered up a touching prayer, Mather cried out to the people that Satan
often transformed himself into an angel of light to deceive men's souls.
The Rev. Mr. Noyes, standing by at the execution of eight accused
persons, exclaimed: "What a sad thing it is to see eight fire-brands of
hell hanging there!" A committee was appointed to ferret out witches, and
children were readily found to court the notoriety and interest which a
share in the work attracted. When the accusers began to utter charges
against the wife of Governor Phipps and relatives of the Mathers, the
authorities took a different view of the monster which they had evolved
out of their superstitious imaginings. Public opinion, which had been
fettered by fear and amazement at the hideous proceedings, began to find
expression in protest against any further sacrifice. Many of the accusers
recanted their testimony, and said that they had given it in order to
save their own lives, dreading to be accused of witchcraft themselves.
The General Court of Massachusetts appointed a general fast and
supplication "that God would pardon all the errors of His servants and
people in a late tragedy raised among them by Satan and his instruments."
Judge Sewall, who had presided at a number of the trials, stood up in his
place in the church and begged the people to pray that the errors which
he had committed "might not be visited by the judgment of an avenging God
on his country, his family and himself." The Rev. Mr. Parris was
compelled to leave the country. Cotton Mather, however, adhered
steadfastly to his belief in witches. He said, among other things equally
astounding to the common sense even of that day, that the devil allowed
the victims of witchcraft to "read Quaker books, the Common Prayer and
popish books," but not the Bible. At the instance of Cotton Mather, and
that of his father, Increase Mather, the president of Harvard, a circular
was sent out signed by Increase Mather and a number of other ministers in
the name of Harvard College, inviting reports of "apparitions,
possessions, enchantments and all extraordinary things wherein the
existence and agency of the invisible world is more sensibly
demonstrated," to be used "as some fit assembly of ministers might
direct." But few replies to the circular were received. The people of
Massachusetts had muzzled the monster, and did not care to turn it loose
again. A monument was recently erected to Rebec