reternatural. After the Mischiefs there
Endeavoured, and since in part Conquered, the terrible Plague, of _Evil
Angels_, hath made its Progress into some other places, where other
Persons have been in like manner Diabolically handled. These our poor
Afflicted Neighbours, quickly after they become _Infected_ and
_Infested_ with these _Daemons_, arrive to a Capacity of Discerning those
which they conceive the _Shapes_ of their Troublers; and notwithstanding
the Great and Just Suspicion, that the _Daemons_ might Impose the
_Shapes_ of Innocent Persons in their _Spectral Exhibitions_ upon the
Sufferers, (which may perhaps prove no small part of the _Witch-Plot_ in
the issue) yet many of the Persons thus Represented, being Examined,
several of them have been Convicted of a very Damnable _Witchcraft_:
yea, more than One _Twenty_ have _Confessed_, that they have Signed unto
a _Book_, which the Devil show'd them, and Engaged in his Hellish Design
of _Bewitching_, and _Ruining_ our Land. _We_ know not, at least _I_
know not, how far the _Delusions_ of Satan may be Interwoven into some
Circumstances of the _Confessions_; but one would think, all the Rules
of Understanding Humane Affairs are at an end, if after so many most
Voluntary Harmonious _Confessions_, made by Intelligent Persons of all
Ages, in sundry Towns, at several Times, we must not Believe the _main
strokes_ wherein those _Confessions_ all agree: especially when we have
a thousand preternatural Things every day before our eyes, wherein the
_Confessors_ do acknowledge their Concernment, and give Demonstration of
their being so Concerned. If the Devils now can strike the minds of men
with any _Poisons_ of so fine a Composition and Operation, that Scores
of Innocent People shall Unite, in _Confessions_ of a Crime, which we
see actually committed, it is a thing prodigious, beyond the Wonders of
the former Ages, and it threatens no less than a sort of a Dissolution
upon the World. Now, by these _Confessions_ 'tis Agreed, _That_ the
Devil has made a dreadful Knot of _Witches_ in the Country, and by the
help of _Witches_ has dreadfully increased that Knot: _That_ these
_Witches_ have driven a Trade of Commissioning their _Confederate
Spirits_, to do all sorts of Mischiefs to the Neighbours, whereupon
there have ensued such Mischievous consequences upon the Bodies and
Estates of the Neighbourhood, as could not otherwise be accounted for:
yea, _That_ at prodigious _Witch-Meetin