"The nobler tendency of culture--and, above all, of scientific
culture--is to honor the dead without groveling before them; to profit
by the past without sacrificing it to the present."--EDWARD B. TYLOR,
_Primitive Culture_.
Most history of New England witchcraft written since 1760 has dishonored
the dead by lavish imputations of imposture, fraud, malice, credulity, and
infatuation; has been sacrificing past acts, motives, and character to
skepticism regarding the sagacity and manliness of the fathers, the
guilelessness of their daughters, and the truth of ancient records.
Transmitted accounts of certain phenomena have been disparaged, seemingly
because facts alleged therein baffle solution by to-day's prevalent
philosophy, which discards some agents and forces that were active of old.
The legitimate tendency of culture has been reversed; what it should have
availed itself of and honored, it has busied itself in hiding and
traducing.
An exception among writers alluded to is the author of the following
extract, who, simply as an historian, and not as an advocate of any
particular theory for the solution of witchcraft, seems ready to let its
works be ascribed to competent agents.
"So far as a presentation of facts is concerned, no account of the
dreadful tragedy has appeared which is more accurate and truthful than
Governor Hutchinson's narrative. His theory on the subject--that it was
wholly the result of fraud and deception on the part of the afflicted
children--will not be generally accepted at the present day, and his
reasoning on that point will not be deemed conclusive.... There is a
tendency to trace an analogy between the phenomena then exhibited and
modern spiritual manifestations."--W. F. POOLE, _Geneal. and Antiq.
Register, October, 1870._
While composing the following work, its writer was borne onward by the
tendency which Poole named. Survey of the field of marvels has been far
short of exhaustive--his purpose made no demand for very extended
researches. Selected cases, representative of the general manifestations
and subject treated of were enough. The aim has been to find in ancient
records, and thence adduce, statements and meanings long resting
unobserved beneath the gathered dust of more than a hundred years, and
therefore practically lost.
The course of search led attention beyond overt acts, to inspection of
some natural germs and their legitimately resultant development into
creeds, which impelled good men on to the enactment of direful tragedy.
Examination of the basement walls--the foundations--of prevalent popular
explanation of ancient wonders, forces conviction that they lack both the
breadth and the materials needful to stability. Modern builders of
witchcraft history have either failed to find, or have deemed unmanageable
by any appliances at their command, and therefore would not attempt to
handle, a vast amount of sound historic stones which are accessible and
can be used. Lacking them, these moderns have let fancy manufacture for
them, and they have builded upon blocks of her fragile stuff which are
fast disintegrating under the chemical action of the world's common sense.
We proposed here an incipient step towards refutation of the sufficiency
and justness of a main theory, now long prevalent, for explaining
satisfactorily very many well-proved marvelous facts. Some such have been
presented on the pages of Hutchinson, Upham, and their followers; and yet
these have been either not at all, or vaguely or ludicrously, commented
upon, or reasoned from. Very many others, and the most important of all as
bases and aids to an acceptable and true solution of the whole, are not
visible where they ought to have conspicuous position. Presentation and
proper use of them might have caused public cognizance to topple over the
edifices which it has pleased modern builders to erect.
It is not our purpose to write history, but to give new explanation of old
events. The long and widely tolerated theory that New England witchcraft
was exclusively but out-workings of mundane fraud, imposture, cunning,
trickery, malice, and the like, has never adequately met the reasonable
demand of common sense, which always asks that specified agents and forces
shall be probably competent to produce all such effects as are distinctly
ascribed to them.
Persons who of old were afflicted in manner that was then called
bewitchment, and others through or from whom the afflictions were alleged
to proceed, are now extensively supposed to have possessed organizations,
temperaments, and properties which rendered them exceptionally pliant
under subtile forces, either magnetic, mesmeric, or psychological, and
who, consequently, at times, could be, and were, made ostensible utterers
of knowledge whose marvelousness indicated mysterious source, and
ostensible performers of acts deemed more than natural, and which, in
fact, were the productions of wills not native in the manifesting forms.
The special forces that produced bewitchment and are put in application
now, do not become sensibly operative upon any other mortals than peculiar
sensitives; and their action upon such is often most easily and
effectively manifested through aid obtained from other similar sensitives.
Selections of both subjects and instrumentalities were of old, and are
now, controlled by general law. Steel needles and iron-filings are not
selected by the magnet's free will when it forces them to leap up from
their resting-places and cleave to itself. Seeming levitation possesses
them, and an invisible force takes them whither gravitation, their usual
holder, would not let them go. It is upon steel, not lead--upon iron, not
stone--that the magnet can execute its marvelous liftings. Nature's
conditions fix selections. The organizations, temperaments, fluids,
solids, and all the various properties, are, to some extent, unlike in any
two human bodies whatsoever, and the range of the differings and
consequent susceptibilities is very wide. A psychological magnet in either
the seen or unseen may have power to draw certain human forms to contact
with itself, and to use them as its tools, and yet lack force to produce
sensible effects upon but few in the mass of living men. Where its action
is most efficient, it controls the movements of what it holds in its
embrace--takes a human form out from control by the spirit which usually
governs it, and through that form manifests its own powers and purposes.
Both the reputed bewitched and bewitching may severally have had but
little, if any, voluntary part in manifesting the remarkable phenomena
that were imputed to them. Where physical organs are used, the public is
prone to deem the performances intentional acts by those whose forms are
operated, while yet the wills of those whose forms are visibly concerned
in marvelous works may have been formerly, as they often now are, little
else than unwilling, and in many cases unconscious tools.
The afflicted--in other words, the bewitched ones--may have actually
perceived,--they no doubt often did,--and also knew, that the annoyances
and tortures they endured were augmented, if not generated, by emanations
proceeding forth from the particular persons whom they named as being
their afflicters; and these afflicters may have been all unconscious that
their own auras were going forth and acting upon the sufferers.
The chief non-intelligent instrumentality employed in producing
miraculous, spiritualistic, necromantic, and other kindred marvels, is now
generally called psychological force--force resident in and put forth from
and by the soul--from and by the will and emotional parts of a living
being; it is the force by which some men control with magic power not only
many animals in the lower orders, but some susceptible members of their
own species; it is a force deep-seated in our being, and may accompany man
when he leaves his outer body, and continue to be his in an existence
beyond the present.
The usurping capabilities of this force were strikingly set forth by the
illustrious Agassiz in his carefully written account of his own sensations
and condition while in a mesmeric trance induced upon him by Rev. Chauncy
Hare Townshend. The great naturalist--the strong man both mentally and
physically--says that he lost all power to use his own limbs--all power to
even _will_ to move them, and that his body was forced against his own
strongest possible opposition to pace the room in obedience to the
mesmerizer's will. Since such force overcame the strongest possible
resistance of the gigantic Agassiz, it is surely credible that less robust
ones, in any and every age, may have been subdued and actuated by it.--See
page 385, in _Facts of Mesmerism, 2d Ed. London, 1844, by Rev. Chauncy
Hare Townshend_.
Those who were accused of bewitching others were fountains from which
invisible intelligences sometimes drew forth properties which aided them
in gaining and keeping control of those whom they entranced or otherwise
used. Also from such there probably sometimes went forth unwilled
emanations that were naturally attracted to other sensitives, who
perceived their source, and pronounced it diabolical, because the influx
thence was annoying. Impersonal natural forces to some extent, and at
times, probably designated the victims who were immolated on witchcraft's
altar.
Citations of evidences and proofs from early historic records, that other
agents and forces had chief part in producing New England witchcraft than
such as modern historians generally have recognized, together with
exposition of legitimate and forceful biases proceeding from articles in
old-time creeds, will exhibit our forefathers in much better aspects than
they wear in intervening history; will halo in innocence some of their
wives and daughters, around whom historians have cast hues appropriate
only to most villainous culprits; and also will manifest sadly misleading
oversights, short-comings, and sophistries by some whose writings have
done much in forming the world's existing erroneous and harsh views and
estimates.
Certain operative, world-wide, and daily occurrences in the present age,
unaccounted for, and often sneered at, by adepts in prevalent sciences and
philosophies, seem to have fair claims for general, candid, and most rigid
scrutiny. Even if despised and contemned of men, they nevertheless are
widely and most efficiently working for the world's good or for its harm.
Testimony to their positive existence is vast in amount, and much of it
comes from witnesses whose words upon any ordinary matters would be
absolutely conclusive.
Something more than twenty-five years ago, mysterious raps on cottage
walls and furniture were traced to cause which, while invisible and
impalpable, could count TEN. A trifle, was that? No; for its teachings and
influences have gone forth widely, and have worked efficiently. They have
broadened nature's domain as conceived of by man, have opened up to him
new fields of study, and have furnished him with a vast amount of new
views and speculations, which are permeating creeds, philosophies,
sciences, explanations of history, and most things appertaining to the
welfare of civilized society. Well may they have thus efficiently
operated, for they have claimed to be, and their potency indicates that
they have been, moved onward by forces greater than pertain to incarnate
men.
Raps by invisible rappers; liftings of tables, pianos, &c., by invisible
lifters; music flowing forth from pianos, harmonicons, and other
instruments having no visible manipulators; pencils writing legibly,
instructively, eloquently, when no visible hand held and moved them;
levitations of tables and human forms; transfer of books and other
objects from one side of rooms to the opposite by invisible carriers;
hands of flesh grasping and holding live coals of fire with impunity;
raisings of human forms from floor to ceiling overhead, and holding them
there by invisible beings; impressions of recognized likenesses of
departed mortals upon the plates of photographists; presentation of moving
and palpable hands and arms where no body is present for their attachment;
materialization of entire forms of the departed, and the speaking and
moving of the re-clad ones so exactly as in life as to be distinctly and
unmistakably recognized by their surviving relatives and familiar
acquaintances;--these phenomena, and many others kindred to them, admit of
being, and we ask that they may be, viewed apart from any and all verbal
or written communications by spirits, and apart from the character,
standing, and habits of spiritualists. Such presentations as have just
been specified may be looked upon as a class by themselves, and as being
worthy the attention and closest scrutiny of devotees to the physical
sciences and all logical minds. Even though they have emerged into view
from a modern Nazareth, the obscurity of their place of issuance is not
conclusive against their virtue to enlighten man, and broaden the extent
of human knowledge.
When, in days to come, some abler and more polished pen shall apply, in
the solution of witchcraft marvels, a theory that shall be based on the
classes of agents, forces, &c., which are now evolving modern marvels, its
fitness and adequacy will attract wide attention, and command general
acceptance. Our work, of course, will fall far short of such results, for
he who here writes possesses no commanding powers,--never had much taste
for historical and antiquarian researches,--has for many years last past
found himself much, very much, more prone to be seeking for mental and
moral wealth in oncoming than in receded times,--possesses only moderate
skill and less than moderate facility in literary composition,--has spent
the greater part of adult life in pursuits which debarred him not only
from much perusal of books either historical, literary, or scientific, but
also from much converse with well-cultured society. Therefore,
necessarily, his whitened locks and waning forces find him consciously
deficient in nearly every qualification for either a good historian or
good expounder and applier of any theory pertaining to profound and
intricate subjects involving occult agents and forces.
Then why write? Perhaps vanity is strong among our motives. Nearly as far
back as memory can take us, we heard from a grandfather's lips accounts of
what his grandfather and others did and suffered when witchcraft raged in
our native parish, and threatened trouble to those occupying the house in
which we were born and reared. From boyhood onward the subject has never
been new to us. We received an early impression, and since have ever felt,
that works more than mortals could perform had transpired there. But who
the workers could have been was long a doleful mystery. Their doings made
them far from pleasant objects of contemplation. In common with most other
natives of the place, we formerly were very willing that the dark matter
should slumber in obscurity--were indisposed to draw attention to its
aspects and character.
But not so in later years. Most people on the spot, however, now are
probably averse to its consideration. Less than three years ago, a parish
committee of arrangements were very solicitous that this dismal subject
should receive very little notice at their bi-centennial celebration.
Their wishes and ours differed widely. What courtesy withheld them from
forbidding, courtesy withheld us from doing extensively. We just opened
there; and now, in continuance, here say that we longed then, on the spot
where he was born, to wash off from their most notorious child much black
dye-stuff in which the world has dipped him, and let them look upon a
fairer complexioned and more estimable personage than they have deemed
that far-famed native. We are vain enough to hope, that, in this
continuance of our speech, we shall adduce facts and views which will
present Salem witchcraft in new and less dismal aspects, and dispel what
seems to dwellers where it transpired a "cloud of darkness." Aside from
vanity, we have been moved by definite desire to give both the people of
Danvers and many others, opportunity to learn facts and truths as yet
perceived by only a few, which give a character to the great witchcraft
scene, vastly less disreputable to those concerned in it than does such as
has been presented by prior expounders, and extensively accepted as
plausible by the public. Teachings of spiritualism have luminated the
places where witchcraft has been sent to slumber; and facts now come into
view which reveal beneficent results where none but baneful ones have been
apparent. Perhaps willingness to show that spiritualism has been an
illumining force to us, and may be so to others, has place among our
motives.
Opportunities for studying spirit manifestations came in the writer's way
more than twenty years since, and have been recurring quite steadily down
to the present hour. Release, long ago, from cramping mill-horse rounds of
professional life and thought, and consequent freedom to live and move
relatively aloof from annoyances and fears which known or suspected
attention to unpopular and tabooed matters is apt to bring, permitted him
to be a more open, avowed, persistent, and studious observer of these
marvelous works than could most other persons _comfortably_, who had spent
early years in academic and collegiate halls. Unhampered by dread of
slurs, innuendoes, hints, or growls from either parishioners, patients, or
clients, he sought, found, and strove to use thoughtfully, critically, and
religiously, extensive and many varied and often very favorable
opportunities for estimating the force and value of alleged evidences and
proofs that we, all of us, are ever living in the midst of agents, forces,
conditions, faculties, powers, and susceptibilities, acting upon or
residing in ourselves and our neighbors, which common observation and
science have not generally recognized. Thus, as he judges, clews have been
acquired to such knowledge as promises, in days not distant, to furnish
not only a solution of ancient witchcraft that will stand the tests of
time and common sense, but cause human physical science to bring within
its embrace agents and forces which have heretofore escaped its
recognition. The varied phenomena of spiritualism, witchcraft, and miracle
are all _within_ nature.
Modern spiritualism, fraught, and all alive, as it is, with evidences, and
some sensible _proofs positive_, of a future life, is to-day more
efficient in retaining faith among thinking men that a life beyond awaits
them, than any and all other forces in operation, or that man can apply.
Science--yes, an advanced _science_, based on observed, proved, and
provable facts of spiritualism, ancient and modern--is the only power we
see that can stay the hope-crushing inroads of the bald materialism which
is now dogging the advancing steps of physical science and liberal culture
throughout enlightened Christendom.
Perception of strong indications, more than twenty years ago, that keen
intelligence wielding strange power was evolving before human senses,
raps, table-tippings, and the like,--which intelligence, if properly
invoked and treated, might become one's helpful teacher,--induced the
author to use as well as possible each occurring opportunity for
increasing his acquaintance with the strange visitants, not doubting that
in the end he should gain wherewith to instruct and benefit both himself
and his fellow-men, enough, and more than enough, to richly compensate for
whatever loss of caste, favor, or reputation his course might occasion.
During his well-meant, protracted, and reverential searchings along the
faintly twilighted borders of spirit-land, ever and anon he has been
catching glimpses of laws, forces, conditions, and agents, which
earth-born beings--the embodied and the disembodied--can, and limitedly
now do, conjointly use for reciprocal communings, and for mutual helps
toward improvement, elevation, and bliss--for social, intellectual, moral,
and religious growth. He means _mutual_; for those who have escaped from
the flesh are helped by intercommunings with mortals. The reward is ample.
His immediate topic is only witchcraft; but light which he seeks to make
bear on that, penetrates below all perceptible phenomena, down to the
question which underlies all others pertaining to man's highest interest,
viz., Does _animism exist_? Or, in other words, is there in nature, or in
God, or anywhere, an animating principle, which, having had
individualizing connection with an organized material form, will retain
its consciousness and individuality after that connection shall have been
dissolved? Who but visible or audible spirits, proving themselves to be
such, can give decisive response to that momentous question? Who but they
can stop the advance of and effectually cripple that growing materialistic
faith which laughs at and tramples over everything save
_demonstration_,--demonstration either scientific or sensible,--but is at
once and permanently palsied when it encounters that? Man knows of none
else who can.
The world as yet is little conscious of the real nature, power, and worth
of spiritualism, or of its own need of help obtainable from no other
perceptible source. Therein lies enfolded not only charity and justice for
our remoter fathers, and correction for later commentators upon them,
which may be brought forth and applied in the present work, but also
PROOFS of man's survival beyond the tomb.
Threescore years and twelve are saying, Spend no more time in general
preparation for your labors, because dangers yearly thicken that your
perishing outer man must forever leave undone what it fails to accomplish
soon. Your future "footprints on the sands of time" will be but few;
therefore now start in right direction, and, as best you can, mark the
path you travel, and thus give some guidance to future wayfarers
journeying toward the goal at which you aim, but lack power to reach.