"_Tituba, the Indian woman, examined March 1, 1692._
"_Q._ Why do you hurt these poor children? What harm have they done unto
you?
"_A._ They do no harm to me. I no hurt them at all."
The first question by the magistrates implies the presence there of the
afflicted children, and of their then seeming to be invisibly hurt. It
also implies the magistrate's assumption that Tituba was hurting them. Her
denial that either they had harmed her or that she was hurting them was
distinct. But the magistrate seemingly doubted its truth or its
sufficiency, for he next asked,--
"_Q._ Why have you done it?
"_A._ I have done nothing. I can't tell when the devil works.
"_Q._ What? Doth the devil tell you that he hurts them?
"_A._ No. He tells me nothing."
She conceded here that the _Devil_ might be, and probably was, at work
upon the children; but _his_ doings were beyond the reach of her
perceptive faculties. _He_ made no communication to her. Thus early her
words indicate that her knowledge of spiritual matters caused her to draw
and adhere to a distinction between _The Devil_ and either _a Spirit_, or
bands of spirits, which distinction she and other mediumistic ones of her
times adhered to, while the public lacked knowledge that facts required
it, and ignorantly called all visitants from spirit realms _The Devil_.
When glancing at Cotton Mather's unpublished account of Mercy Short, we
copied from it the following statement: "As the bewitched in other parts
of the world have commonly had no other style for their tormentors but
only THEY and THEM, so had Mercy Short." Clairvoyants and all who obtained
knowledge of spirits through perceptions by their own interior organs
seldom, if ever, have seriously spoken of either seeing, hearing, or
feeling the _Devil_. Possibly, at times, some may have done so by way of
accommodation to the unillumined world's modes of speech. But, as Mather
says, they have, the world over, _generally_ called the personages
perceived, "_They_" and "_Them_." Such a fact demands regard. The personal
observers of spiritual beings have never been accustomed to designate them
by bad names. Fair inference from this is, that such beings have not
generally worn forbidding aspects. It has been the reporters, and not the
utterers, of descriptive accounts of spiritual beings who have made use of
the terms "devil," "satan," and the like. Mather perceived the common
"style" of the bewitched, and yet the warping habit of Christendom made
him preserve continuance of inaccurate reporting; for he, like most
others in his day, persistently wrote "devil," where that name was not
announced, and ought not to have been foisted in. Tituba saw no one whom
she ever called _The Devil_, though history has taught that she did.
"_Q._ Do you never see something appear in some shape? _A._ No. Never see
anything."
This answer is not true if construed literally in connection with its
question. She did, as will soon appear, sometimes see many things
clairvoyantly, but never _The Devil_, who had just before been mentioned.
"_Q._ What familiarity have you with the devil, or what is it that you
converse withal? Tell the truth, who it is that hurts them. _A._ The
devil, for aught I know."
She persistently admits that the devil _may_ be then and there at work,
but asserts that she does not know anything about _him_.
"_Q._ What appearance, or how doth he appear when he hurts them?"
She makes no reply when asked how the _Devil_ hurts. She ignores _him_.
"_Q._ With what shape, or what is _he_ like that hurts them? _A._ Like a
man, I think. Yesterday, I being in the lean-to chamber, I saw a thing
_like a man_, that told me serve him. I told him no, I would not do such
thing."
_Devil_ had now been dropped from the question, and _he_ substituted. What
is _he_ like? Then she promptly mentioned an apparition not only visible,
but audible, who, if carefully scanned, may prove to have been chief
author and enactor of Salem witchcraft. She who saw and heard him says he
was "like a man, I think,"--was "a thing like a man." According to her
perceptions he was not the devil. She did not know the devil. Others at
that time and ever since have called her visitant the devil. But Tituba,
who saw, heard, and thus knew him, did not and would not.
Next comes in, parenthetically, a summary of her sayings and doings, as
follows:--
("She charges Goody Osburn and Sarah Good, as those that hurt them
children, and would have had her done it; she saith she hath seen four,
two which she knew not; she saw them last night as she was washing the
room. They told me hurt the children, and would have had me gone to
Boston. There was five of them with the man. They told me if I would not
go and hurt them, they would do so to me. At first I did agree with them,
but afterward, I told them I would do so no more.")
According to this summary, apparitions multiplied; for, besides the man,
she saw four women around herself: that company threatened to hurt her if
she would not unite with them in hurting the children. Two of these were
apparitions of her living neighbors, Good and Osburn, then under arrest;
the other three were strangers. We shall soon see that she believed, what
is probably true, that apparitions of particular persons can be not only
presented by occult intelligences to the inner vision, but put into
apparent vigorous action, while the genuine persons thus presented in
counterfeit have no consciousness either of being present at the
exhibition, or of performing, either then or at any other time, the acts
which they seem to put forth.
The conceptions which this simple mind held concerning the nature, powers,
and purposes of those who came to her in manner strange to most mortals,
are pretty clearly indicated. By her likening them to men and women, and
by her protests against their forcing her to act cruelly, she justifies
the inference that she failed to see in or about them anything very
forbidding, awful, or satanic. She admitted the possibility that the devil
might have hurt the children, but also asserted that, if so, _his_ action
was unbeknown to her. The "something like a man," together with these
women and herself under compulsion, were the afflicting ones, so far as
her vision or other senses could determine. _She_ nowhere applies the term
"devil" to her male apparition. No hoofs, horns, or tail, no sable hues or
frightful form, are brought to view by this clairvoyant's description of
her occult companions. They wore, in her sight, the semblances of a man
and of women--not of devils.
How different would have been results had her simple words and instructive
facts been credited and made the basis of judicial decisions! Could she
have been calmly and rationally listened to by minds freed from a blinding
and irritating faith that Christendom's witchcraft devil was her companion
and prompter, her plain and definite exposition of the actors who
generated troubles which were profound mysteries to her superiors in
external knowledge and penetration, would have brought all the marvels of
that day within the domain of natural things, and warded off the horrors
which ensued.
"_Q._ Would they have had you hurt the children last night? _A._ Yes, but
I was sorry, and I said I would do so no more, but told I would fear God.
_Q._ But why did not you do so before? _A._ Why, they tell me I had done
so before, and therefore I must go on. (These were the four women and the
man, but she knew none but Osburn and Good only; the others were of
Boston.")
If we get at what Tituba meant by the words just quoted, it was
substantially this: "They wanted me, and forced me against my will, to
join with them in hurting the children last night. I was sorry that I was
forced to act cruelly, and told them that I would not be forced to it
again, but would serve God. I did not take that stand before, because they
told me I had already worked with them, and therefore must go on.
"_Q._ At first beginning with them, what then appeared to you? What was it
like that got you to do it? _A._ One like a man, just as I was going to
sleep, came to me. This was when the children was first hurt. He said he
would kill the children and she would never be well; and he said if I
would not serve him he would do so to me."
The witness was here apparently brought to describe her _first_ interview
with the author of Salem witchcraft. We see her now standing at the
fountainhead of the devastating torrent which soon deluged the region far
around with terror, anguish, and blood. Who first appeared to her? Who was
the prime mover? And when was he first seen? Subsequent statements are
soon to show that on Friday, January 15, 1692, six weeks and four days
before the time when she gave in this testimony, _one like a man, just as
she was going to sleep_, came to her and demanded her aid in hurting the
children. The fact is clearly stated that five days before the Wednesday
evening when the children were first hurt by spirit appliances, and
supposed to be taken sick, "_one like a man_," when Tituba was about going
to sleep, came to her and avowed his purpose, in advance, to torture and
even kill the children. From that time forth she knew the source of the
strange operations in her master's family.
"_Q._ Is that the same man that appeared before to you, that appeared last
night and told you this? _A._ Yes."
Her visitor was the same person on these two different occasions, which
were more than six weeks apart, and in her various clairvoyant excursions
and feats he was frequently, if not always, her attendant.
"_Q._ What other likenesses besides a man hath appeared unto you? _A._
Sometimes like a hog--sometimes like a great black dog--four times."
"The man" probably assumed or presented those brutish forms. A frequent
teaching of spirit visitants is, that they "can assume any _form_ which
the occasion requires;" they also have often given the impression that
they cannot assume _hues_ brighter than inherently pertain to their own
intellectual and moral conditions, but of this we have yet no conclusive
information.
"_Q._ But what did they say unto you? _A._ They told me serve him, and
that was a good way. That was the black dog. I told him I was afraid. He
told me he would be worse then to me."
Her dog could talk. She and the court obviously understood the dog to be
the same being, essentially, as the "one like a man." For,--
"_Q._ What did you say to him, then, after that? _A._ I answer I will
serve you no longer. He told me he would do me hurt then."
Can any one doubt that she conceived herself to be speaking to the same
being, though in dog form, that she had yielded to before in form like a
man? There is no indication that she had _previously_ served a dog, and
yet she says to this one, I will serve you _no longer_.
"_Q._ What other creatures have you seen? _A._ A bird. _Q._ What bird?
_A._ A little yellow bird. _Q._ Where does it keep? _A._ With the man, who
hath pretty things more besides. _Q._ What other pretty things? _A._ He
hath not showed them unto me, but he said he would show them to me
to-morrow, and told me if I would serve him, I should have the bird. _Q._
What other creatures did you see? _A._ I saw two cats, one red, another
black, as big as a little dog. _Q._ What did these cats do? _A._ I don't
know. I have seen them two times. _Q._ What did they say? _A._ They say
serve them. _Q._ When did you see them? _A._ I saw them last night. _Q._
Did they do any hurt to you or threaten you? _A._ They did scratch me.
_Q._ When? _A._ After prayer; and scratched me because I would not serve
her. And when they went away _I could not see_, but they stood by the
fire. _Q._ What service do they expect from you? _A._ They say more hurt
to the children. _Q._ How did you pinch them when you hurt them? _A._ The
other pull me and haul me to pinch the child, and I am very sorry for it."
The cats also as well as the dog spoke and commanded her obedience. She
saw these the night before her examination. "When they went away," she
says, "I could not see." Those words may admit of two distinct and
different meanings. First, that the cats disappeared without her being
able to notice their exit; or, second, that before they went she became
spiritually blind--"could not longer see" clairvoyantly. In a subsequent
statement she pleads a sudden obscuration of her internal vision. All
clairvoyants are subject to sudden interruptions of their spiritual power
to see.
She was pulled and hauled by "the other" with a view to force her to
"pinch the child." Here again her obvious conviction was that the "other"
was essentially more than mere brute. She did not think a cat pulled and
hauled her, but meant that when the cats visited her, the "something like
a man"--"the other"--was also present, and urged her on to mischief.
"_Q._ What made you hold your arm when you were searched? What had you
there? _A._ I had nothing. _Q._ Do not those cats suck you? _A._ No, never
yet. I would not let them. But they had almost thrust me into the fire.
_Q._ How do you hurt those that you pinch? Do you get those cats, or other
things, to do it for you? Tell us how it is done. _A._ _The man sends the
cats to me, and bids me pinch them_; and I think I went once to Mr.
Griggs's, and have pinched her this day in the morning. The man brought
Mr. Griggs's maid to me, and made me pinch her."
By "the man" she obviously meant her frequent spirit visitor. He it was
who brought the cats to her, and made her pinch them, and by so doing
pinch the "maid," who physically was miles distant. Such is her
statement. An inference from it is, that properties from Elizabeth
Hubbard,--the maid in question,--who was among the afflicted ones, and was
a member of _the circle_, were drawn out from her by "the man," and made
component parts of apparitional cats formed by the man's thought and will
powers, which seeming cats, being pinched by Tituba's spirit fingers, the
Hubbard girl, some of whose properties were used for constructing those
apparitional cats, felt the pinchings, first in her spirit, and thence in
her flesh, though her body was two or three miles distant from the
pincher. In that mode "the man" commanded the use of some properties in
Tituba, by which he produced torture in a mediumistic physical organism
then being far away. Another mode of spirit operation is indicated. Tituba
confessed to a dim consciousness that once, by some process, her
spirit-self had been got over to Dr. Griggs's, and pinched the maid at her
home. Again, she believed that the same maid had been brought to her
(Tituba's) abode and pinched there. Also it will be seen a little further
on, that, Tituba being charged with having been over at the maid's home on
a specified day, denied having been there at that particular time, but
admitted that her apparition might, unconsciously to herself, have been
seen there then, for she says, "may be send something like me."
We enter a distinct protest against stigmatizing such testimony as
"incoherent nonsense." In response to a command to tell _how_ the
mysterious inflictions were brought about, this untaught, ignorant woman,
calmly and with much distinctness, indicated four or five modes by which
psychologic forces were brought to bear upon mediumistic subjects. She
had seen the processes, and, in her simple way, told what she had learned
by personal observation and experience; and thus she helps us, at this
day, to fathom and expound the mysteries of witchcraft more effectually
than do all her cotemporaries. Notwithstanding her limited command of
language, her statements were about as distinct and instructive as any one
then could have made upon such a topic; but the devil-warped public mind
of that day was unable to see the literal import of her testimony, or to
turn her knowledge to good account.
Two other women, Sarah Good and Sarah Osburn, names previously mentioned,
were, on the same March 1, 1692, under examination as co-operators with
Tituba in practicing witchcraft.
"_Q._ Did you ever go with these women? _A._ They are very strong, and
pull me, and make me go with them. _Q._ Where did you go? _A._ Up to Mr.
Putnam's, and make me hurt the child. _Q._ Who did make you go? _A._ A man
that is very strong, and these two women, Good and Osburn; but I am sorry.
_Q._ How did you go? What do you ride upon? _A._ I ride upon a stick or
pole, and Good and Osburn behind me; we ride taking hold of one another;
don't know _how_ we go, for I saw no trees nor path, but was presently
there when we were up."
The child above referred to was Ann Putnam, daughter, twelve years old, of
Thomas and Ann Putnam, who resided from two to three miles north-west from
the parsonage. This girl, Ann, was one of the excessively bewitched; that
is, was one of the most impressible and mediumistic members of _The
Circle_. Tituba and her two fellow-prisoners had, either all as spirits,
or she as a conscious spirit and the other two as apparitions, visited
that child at her home; and, according to her own apprehension, the three
women all mounted one pole, rose up into the air, and were forthwith at
Mr. Putnam's, having noticed neither path nor trees on the way. No reader
will apprehend that Tituba's physical body then left the house of Mr.
Parris and went off two miles or more, on a winter's night, to Mr.
(Thomas) Putnam's house. She says that they were "presently [instantly]
there." It was only her spirit form--_thought_ form--that went riding upon
a pole above all woods and paths. But why to Thomas Putnam's? Probably
because his wife and his daughter, as subsequent events showed, were both
intensely mediumistic or susceptible to influence by _thought_ beings;
they were persons upon whom such beings could work efficiently; and that
was the special reason, probably, for a visit to them. "The man" may well
be presumed to have possessed perceptive powers that could determine with
much accuracy what persons in all the region round about possessed the
constitutional properties and the surroundings which would permit them to
become pliable and serviceable implements in executing any scheme he had
devised. Subsequent events proved that he selected and used such as
enabled him, through intense human agony and bloodshed, to break in pieces
and abolish a most cramping and enslaving creed devil-ward, which, like a
horrid and disabling nightmare, had for centuries been depressing and
agonizing all Christendom. Whatever was his design, his selection of
instrumentalities facilitated the out-working of a broad and happy
emancipation from vast mental evil. It abolished prosecutions for
witchcraft throughout both America and Europe.
The ostensible object of that mental journey was to hurt the child. Such
was the man's apparent intention. That man was "very strong," and he
accomplished his purpose. Ann was hurt. His will-power was such, that,
having once got hold of the elements of three susceptible and ignorant
women, they were completely under his control. Tituba, who seems to have
been always a _conscious_ medium, yielded perforce to him. Her own
selfhood fought against his cruelties, and she felt sorry for what she was
forced to do. When under examination she made free confession of her
involuntary participation in the tormenting invasions upon innocent girls,
thus unwittingly jeopardizing her own life. She seems to have been frank
and truthful.
"_Q._ How long since you began to pinch Mr. Parris's children? _A._ I did
not pinch them at first, but they made me afterward. _Q._ Have you seen
Good and Osburn ride upon a pole? _A._ Yes; and have held fast by me; I
was not at Mr. Griggs's but once; but it may be send something like me;
neither would I have gone, but they tell me they will hurt me."
Her statement that "it may be send something like me," shows her belief,
and probably her knowledge, that her "very strong" "something like a man"
was able to produce the apparition of a mediumistic person even where such
person had no consciousness of being present. Spirits, in modern times,
often produce such effects, and show thereby that Tituba's comprehension
of the case may have been in harmony with the nature of things, and
strictly correct. She repeats again that her participation in the affairs
was forced--that others made her pinch.
"_Tituba._ Last night they tell me I must kill somebody with a knife. _Q._
Who were they that told you so? _A._ Sarah Good and Osburn, and they would
have had me kill Thomas Putnam's child last night. (The child also
affirmed that at the same time they would have had her cut off her own
head; for if she would not, they told her Tituba would cut it off. And
then she complained at the same time of a knife cutting her. When her
master hath asked her (Tituba?) about these things, she saith they will
not let her tell, but tell her if she tells, her head shall be cut off.)
_Q._ Who tells you so? _A._ The man, Good, and Osburn's wife. (Goody Good
came to her last night when her master was at prayer, and would not let
her hear, and she could not hear a good while.) Good hath one of those
birds, the yellow-bird, and would have given me it, but I would not have
it. And in prayer-time she stopped my ears, and would not let me hear.
_Q._ What should you have done with it? _A._ Give it to the children,
which yellow-bird hath been several times seen by the children. I saw
Sarah Good have it on her hand when she came to her when Mr. Parris was at
prayer. I saw the bird suck Good between the fore-finger and long-finger
upon the right hand."
Those statements relating to the use of the knife, apparently
_volunteered_ by Tituba and confirmed by the child, are quite suggestive.
Assuming that there was present with them some powerful male spirit bent
upon forceful action, and who, through Tituba and other impressibles, had
obtained some palpable hold upon certain human forms and the affairs of
external life, it was in his power to excite in the minds of any and all
who had then been brought into rapport with himself, such ideas as those
relating to the knife, and also to make the psychologized girl experience
the sensation of being actually cut by it. Such would now be deemed an
easy feat by any fair psychologist, either in the gross form or out of it,
provided he had a favorable subject on whom to operate.
The same spirit, too, drawing elements from Mrs. Good, and using them,
could make Tituba feel as though Mrs. Good was by her side and making her
suddenly deaf in prayer-time, even though it was the male spirit himself
who then closed her ears.
Evidences of mediumistic capabilities in either the afflicted or the
afflicters are worthy of distinct observation, and therefore we draw
attention to the statement that the yellow-bird "hath been several times
seen _by the children_." Therefore the sufferers were clairvoyants, as
well as the accused.
"_Q._ Did you never practice witchcraft in your own country? _A._ No;
never before now."
That answer renders it probable that previous to the winter then passing
she had never been conscious of the presence of spirits, or of
conversations with or subjection to them. She, perhaps, reveals a lurking
suspicion that her experiences of late might be witchcrafts. But her
notions as to what constituted that might well, if not necessarily, be
very different from those existing in the more unfolded and logical minds
of her master and her examiners, who made the chief essence of it consist
in a compact made with a Majestic and Malignant Devil--such a devil as
would differ very widely in appearance from Tituba's "_man_." She freely
described the unsought presence of a spirit-man with her on sundry
occasions; also her talks with him, and forced service under him. This
essentially was only disclosure of the fact that her own organism and
temperaments were such and so conditioned that disembodied intelligences
could sometimes be seen and heard by her, and could force her to be their
tool. Her witchcraft was devoid of voluntary compact to serve an evil one;
devoid of evil intent in its practice. If she confessed herself to be a
witch, it was only a kindly and loving one, desiring to be truthful and
good, and inflicting hurt only when forced to it. She confessed only to
clairvoyance, clairaudience, and weakness of her own will-powers.
"_Q._ Did you see them do it now while you are examining (being examined)?
_A._ No, I did not see them. But I saw them hurt at other times. I saw
Good have a cat beside the yellow-bird which was with her."
Obviously some contortions, antics, or sufferings which the afflicted
girls, who were present at the examination, had just experienced or were
then manifesting, led to the question, "Did you see them do it now?" Here
again appears the assumption of the court that Tituba might be gifted with
powers or faculties which would enable her to discern animate and
designing workers who were invisible by external optics. Her inner sight
was closed then, but at some other times had been open.
"_Q._ What hath Osburn got to go with her? _A._ A thing; I don't know what
it is. I can't name it. I don't know how it looks. She hath two of them.
One of them hath wings, and two legs, and a head like a woman. The
children saw the same but yesterday, which afterward turned into a woman.
_Q._ What is the other thing that Goody Osburn hath? _A._ A thing all over
hairy; all the face hairy, and a long nose, and I don't know how to tell
how the face looks; with two legs; it goeth upright, and is about two or
three foot high, and goeth upright like a man; and last night it stood
before the fire, in Mr. Parris's hall."
The obscurity of this description is fully paralleled by the prophet
Ezekiel, who, in presenting the beings seen in the first of his "visions
of God," uses the following language, in chap. i.: "They had the likeness
of a man, and every one had four faces, and every one had four wings; and
their feet were straight feet; and the sole of their feet was like the
sole of a calf's foot; and they sparkled like the color of burnished
brass. And they had the hands of a man under their wings on their four
sides; and they four had their faces and their wings; and their wings were
joined one to another; and they turned not when they went; they went every
one straight forward; as for the likeness of their faces, they four had
the face of a man, and the face of a lion, on the right side; and they
four had the face of an ox on the left side; they four also had the face
of an eagle." This quotation from the Bible hints with much distinctness
that inherent difficulties may beset any clairvoyant who undertakes to set
forth in our language, which was formed for description of material
objects, some things which are occasionally perceived by the spiritual
senses. Where the prophet was so vague and mystical we may pardon the
ignorant slave if she failed to be very lucid, and if one suspects her of
attempting to put forth nothing but fiction, because she was so obscure,
how can he consistently withhold similar suspicions in relation to the
prophet?
We will pass to the children's credit the fact that they also saw Osburn's
ungainly and hairy attendant.
"_Q._ Who was that appeared to Hubbard as she was going from Proctor's?
_A._ It was Sarah Good, and I saw her send the wolf to her."
Facts are transpiring in the present age which indicate with much
distinctness that a spirit can present the semblance of a spirit-beast or
other spirit-object to the vision of many clairvoyants at the same time,
and also that he can, if he so elect, psychologize simultaneously all
clairvoyants with whom he is in rapport, and cause them all to believe
that they see any beast or object which his mind merely conceives of with
distinctness. Therefore sight of a wolf by the mediumistic Hubbard girl,
and Tituba's perception of the same proceeding from mediumistic Sarah
Good, could all be produced by the mere volition of that "something like a
man," provided only that he was then in rapport with all of those three
sensitive ones.
"_Q._ What clothes doth the man appear unto you in? _A._ Black clothes
sometimes; sometimes serge coat of other color; a tall man with white
hair, I think. _Q._ What apparel do the women wear? _A._ I don't know what
color. _Q._ What kind of clothes hath she? _A._ Black silk hood with white
silk hood under it, with top-knots; which woman I know not, but have seen
her in Boston when I lived there. _Q._ What clothes the little woman? _A._
Serge coat, with a white cap, as I think. (The children having fits at
this very time, she was asked who hurt them. She answers, Goody Good; and
the children affirmed the same. But Hubbard being taken in an extreme fit,
after [ward] she (Tituba) was asked who hurt her (Hubbard), and she said
she could not tell, but said they blinded her and would not let her see;
and after that was once or twice taken dumb herself.")
That account of the clothes described the usual costumes of the time. We
are glad to hear her say, "A tall man, with white hair, I think." That is
her description of the "something like a man," and "the man" who has been
so demonstrative. A tall man with white hair, need not be a very frightful
object, and we can readily conceive that such a mind as Tituba's might be
perfectly calm and self-possessed in his presence, and never imagine that
abler minds might confound such a one with the devil. She never calls him
the devil. The fact that she was made dumb two or three times, gives her
case some resemblance to those of Ezekiel and Zacharias. Her ears, as
before stated, had been stopped by Good, as she supposed, one evening
during prayer-time. Thus we find her organs of sense subject to just such
control as invisible intelligent operators exercised over prophetic or
mediumistic ones of old, and such as spirits exercise over many mortal
forms to-day. Her clairvoyance was obscured, perhaps, by "the man" when
she was asked who was hurting the Hubbard girl, and replied that they
blinded her now.
_Second Examination, March 2, 1692._
"_Q._ What covenant did you make with that man that came to you? What did
he tell you?"
The first of those two questions was the crucial one at a trial for
witchcraft. Had she made a _covenant_ with the devil, or any devotee of
his? That was the main point to be determined. If she had, she was a
witch, according to the prevalent creed; if she had not, she might be
innocent of witchcraft. But seemingly the court could not wait for an
answer, because, in the same breath, it asked, What did your visitant tell
you?
"_A._ He tell me he God, and I must believe him and serve him six years,
and he would give me many fine things. _Q._ How long ago was this? _A._
About six weeks and a little more; Friday night before Abigail was ill."
That last answer is very instructive. It fixes the exact time when one of
the children in Mr. Parris's family was first attacked. For this second
day's examination was held on Wednesday, March 2. It will appear from the
above and future answers that the specters first attacked the children on
a Wednesday evening, just six weeks before this 2d of March. The man
appeared to and talked with Tituba on the Friday evening before that
Wednesday in January.
The testimony, therefore, takes us back to January 20th as the
commencement of overt manifestation of spirit infliction of sufferings
there. Five days further back, i. e., the evening of January 15, is
apparently the date of "the man's" first recognized appearance.
Therefore, until better information is obtained, we shall regard that as
the date of the primal advent of the genuine author of witchcraft at Salem
Village, whom we deem to have been also its regulator through its
heart-rending unfoldings.
"_Q._ What did he say you must do more? Did he say you must write
anything? Did he offer you any paper? _A._ Yes, the next time he come to
me; and showed me some fine things, something like creatures, a little
bird something like green and white. _Q._ Did you promise him this when he
first spake to you? Then what did you answer him? _A._ I then said this: I
told him I could not believe him God. I told him I ask my master, and
would have gone up, but he stopt me and would not let me. _Q._ What did
you promise him? _A._ The first time I believe him God, and then he was
glad. _Q._ What did he say to you then? What did he say you must do? _A._
Then he tell me they must meet together."
There is some obscurity in this quotation, which raises the question
whether the witness contradicts herself by stating that at her first
interview she believed that her visitant was God himself (as John the
Revelator did that a prophet returning from the spirit spheres and
appearing to him was God), and her stating again that at the first
interview she told him she could not believe that he was God, and proposed
to go up and ask her master, Mr. Parris, what he thought about it, but was
held back by her spirit-attendants from doing so. There is, we say,
obscurity as to whether the account makes her apply both of these opposing
statements to her conceptions of her visitor at the first interview with
him, or whether it was not till a subsequent meeting that she doubted his
Godship. As reported, her examiners are made quite as hard to understand
and track as she is in her answers. But, upon a careful reading, we judge
it fair and proper to conclude that her doubts concerning the character of
her acquaintance were expressed as late as at the meeting on Wednesday,
January 20, and not on the previous Friday.
"_Q._ When did he say you must meet together? _A._ He tell me Wednesday
next, at my master's house; and then we all [did] meet together, and that
night I saw them all stand in the corner--all four of them--and the man
stand behind me, and take hold of me, and make me stand still in the
hall."
We now must relinquish doubt as to the meetings at the parsonage, for here
we have distinct historical mention of a _circle_, which met "at Mr.
Parris's house" for the purpose of practically manifesting the skill and
powers, not of learners, but of an expert in the wonders of "necromancy,
magic, and especially of _Spiritualism_." This circle met, at five days'
notice, on the evening of January 20, 1692. A man, or "something like a
man," was at the head of it, and five females, three of them at least
embodied ones, were his assistants, or rather were reservoirs from whence
he drew forces with which to experiment upon two little mediumistic girls.
If a club of women and girls sometimes met for such purposes as are
alleged in foregoing citations,--and perhaps it did in a loose, irregular
way,--we fancy that Tituba's tutor was ever among them taking notes,
scrutinizing their several properties, capabilities, and circumstances,
and planning when and how to use them for most efficient accomplishment of
his purposes. The fact that he was present as author and master spirit
when the first act of the Salem Village tragedy was visibly manifested
through the twitchings and contortions of two little girls, is distinctly
shown by Tituba's testimony. Therefore henceforth there can be neither
historical nor philanthropic justice in imputing to the brains and wills
of the little girls what a present and conscious clairvoyant witness
imputes distinctly to one who looked "something like a man." Give to
him--whoever he was--give to him his just dues; also bestow upon the girls
neither censure nor praise for the help which their organisms and
temperaments necessarily afforded him. This meeting of apparitions, be it
noted and remembered, took place immediately _before_ the sickness of the
children came on, and during its session, the children were pinched, and
thus first became "afflicted ones." On that Wednesday night "Abigail first
became ill."
"_Q._ Where was your master then? _A._ In _the other room_. _Q._ What time
of night? _A._ A little before prayer-time. _Q._ What did this man say to
you when he took hold of you? _A._ He say, Go into _the other room_ and
see the children, and do hurt to them and pinch them. And then I went in
and would not hurt them a good while; I would not hurt Betty; I loved
Betty; but they haul me, and make me pinch Betty, and the next Abigail;
and then quickly went away altogether a[fter] I had pinch them. _Q._ Did
you go into that room in your own person, and all the rest? _A._ Yes; and
my master did not see us, for they would not let my master see."
Mr. Parris and the children seem from the above to have been in the same
apartment that evening, for Tituba states that he was "in the other room,"
and her dictator said to her, "Go into the other room," and hurt the
children. That the master of the house was present with his daughter and
niece then, may be indicated also in the statement that "they would not
let my master see;" for this implies that they were in his presence,
though invisible. If she went to the room in her physical form--which is
not stated, and is not probable--though she did go there in her "own
_person_," the others went only as spirits or as apparitions; and they did
not so enrobe or materialize themselves as to be visible by outward eyes,
and therefore did not become visible to Mr. Parris--they "would not let"
him see. The first infliction upon the children, therefore, was made in
his very presence, but by invisible hands--spirit hands or apparitional
hands--touching the spirit forms of the mediumistic little girls, and
through their own inner forms reaching, paining, and convulsing their
physical bodies. It is interesting to note that because Tituba "loved
Betty," she was able to resist the pressure upon her "a good while;" but
her feeble powers were incompetent to oppose unyielding and effectual
resistance to the strong will of the producer of painful experiences.
"_Q._ Did you go with the company? _A._ No. I staid, and the man staid
with me. _Q._ What did he then to you? _A._ He tell me my master go to
prayer, and he read in book, and he ask me what I remember: but don't you
remember anything."
This account fails to furnish any very conclusive evidence that either of
the four other women was on that occasion consciously present with Tituba
and the man; it need only indicate the probability that he drew properties
from each of them, wherever located, whether in the Village, in Boston, or
elsewhere, which enabled him to present their apparitions to Tituba as
helpers, and to effect rapport with and get power over the children. When
his immediate purpose had been accomplished, no one but the man could be
seen by her. He perhaps left the female apparitions to dissolve when his
further need of their properties ceased. There is no evidence that Good
and Osburn were conscious of being present where Tituba saw them, and
therefore the other two female forms may have been purely
apparitional--mental fabrics of "the man." But important points are clear.
The man's controlling will, and subjugated Tituba's conscious self, were
there.
"_Q._ Did he ask you no more but the first time to serve him? Or the
second time? _A._ Yes, he ask me again if I serve him six years; and he
come the next time and show me a book. _Q._ And when would he come then?
_A._ The next Friday, and showed me a book in the daytime, betimes in the
morning. _Q._ And what book did he bring, a great or little book? _A._ He
did not show it me, nor would not, but had it in his pocket. _Q._ Did he
not make you write your name? _A._ No, not yet, for my mistress called me
into the other room. _Q._ What did he say you must do in that book? _A._
He said write and put my name to it. _Q._ Did you write? _A._ Yes, once, I
made a mark in the book, and made it with red like blood. _Q._ Did he get
it out of your body? _A._ He said he must get it out. The next time he
come again, he gave me a pin tied in a stick to do it with; but he no let
me blood with it as yet, but intended another time when he came again.
_Q._ Did you see any other marks in his book? _A._ Yes, a great many; some
marks red, some yellow; he opened his book, and a great many marks in it.
_Q._ Did he tell you the names of them? _A._ Yes, of two; no more: Good
and Osburn; and he say they made them marks in that book, and he showed
them me. _Q._ How many marks do you think there was? _A._ Nine. _Q._ Did
they write their names? _A._ They made marks. Goody Good said she made her
mark, but Goody Osburn would not tell. She was cross to me. _Q._ When did
Good tell you she set her hand to the book? _A._ The same day I came
hither to prison. _Q._ Did you see the man that morning? _A._ Yes, a
little in the morning, and he tell me the magistrates come up to examine
me. _Q._ What did he say you must say? _A._ He tell me tell nothing; if I
did, he would cut my head off."
The questions relating to the book and signatures were based on, and made
important by, then prevalent belief that one's signature in the devil's
book proved the signing of a covenant to be henceforth his servant.
Tituba's statement that she had seen therein Sarah Good's signature in her
own blood, well might be then deemed strong evidence that Mrs. Good was a
witch, and was guilty of witchcraft. But we doubt whether the witness had
any conception of the fatal import of her statement. Her testimony that
Goody Osburn was cross to her, while amusing, is also suggestive of the
deep question whether even an apparition, produced by use of unconscious
elements drawn from a human system, could or would be so permeated with
the existing mental and emotional moods of the person from whom they were
drawn as to cause those moods to be perceived and felt by those who might
see, and receive influences from, the apparition. "The man" told her that
the magistrates had come or were coming to examine her. She might have
known this already, and might not. Be that as it may, on the morning of
her examination A SPIRIT spoke to her. His counsel was, that she should
say nothing. This advice seems wise. But it was not very "cunning" in her
to repeat it, and make known its source "in presence of Authority."
Willing or not she was there constrained to speak out. Robert Calef, in
"More Wonders of the Invisible World," reports her as saying, "that her
master did beat her and otherwise abuse her to make her confess and accuse
(such as he called) her sister witches, and that whatsoever she said by
way of confessing, or accusing others, was the effect of such usage."
"_Q._ Tell us true; how many women do you use to come when you ride
abroad? _A._ Four of them; these two, Osburn and Good, and those two
strangers. _Q._ You say there was nine. Did he tell you who they were?
_A._ No, he no let me see, but he tell me I should see them the next time.
_Q._ What sights did you see? _A._ I see a man, a dog, a hog, and two
cats, a black and red, and the strange monster was Osburn's that I
mentioned before; this was the hairy imp. The man would give it to me, but
I would not have it. _Q._ Did he show you in the book which was Osburn's
and which was Good's mark? _A._ Yes, I see their marks. _Q._ But did he
tell you the names of the other? _A._ No, sir. _Q._ And what did he say to
you when you made your mark? _A._ He said, Serve me; and always serve me.
The man with the two women came from Boston. _Q._ How many times did you
go to Boston? _A._ I was going and then came back again. I never was at
Boston. _Q._ Who came back with you again? _A._ The man came back with me,
and the women go away; I was not willing to go. _Q._ How far did you
go--to what town? _A._ I never went to any town. I see no trees, no town.
_Q._ Did he tell you where the nine lived? _A._ Yes; some in Boston and
some here in this town, but he would not tell me who they were."
We have now presented the full text of Tituba's testimony as recorded by
Corwin and printed by Drake. Severed from the leading and jumbled
questions which drew it forth, and reduced to a simple narrative, her
statement would in substance be nearly as follows:--
Something like a man came to me just as I was going to sleep the Friday
night before Abigail was taken ill, six weeks and a little more ago, who
then told me that he was God, that I must believe him, and that if I would
serve him six years he would give me many fine things. He said there must
be a meeting at my master's house the next Wednesday, and on the evening
of that day he and four women came there. Then I told him I could not
believe that he was God, and proposed to go and ask Mr. Parris what he
thought on that point; but the man held me back. They forced me against my
will and my love for Betty to pinch the children; we did pinch them. That
was the first night that Abigail was sick. Sometimes I saw the
appearances of dogs, cats, birds, hogs, wolves, and a nondescript animal,
some of whom spoke to me, and talked like the man. Yesterday, when I was
in the lean-to chamber, I saw a thing like a man,--the same that I had
seen before,--who asked me to serve him; and last night, when I was
washing the room, the man and the four women all came again, and wanted me
to hurt the children; and we all went up to Mr. Thomas Putnam's, and hurt
Ann, and cut her with a knife. I went to the Hubbard girl once, and
pinched her, and once the man brought her over to me, and I pinched her;
but I was not there when they say I was, though it may be that the man
sent my apparition over there then without my knowing it. I once saw what
looked like a wolf go out from Mrs. Good and run to the Hubbard girl. How
we travel I don't know; we go up in the air, and we are instantly at the
place we intend to go to; we see no trees, no roads. The man brings cats
or other things to me, and I pinch them; and by doing so the girls are
pinched. Sometimes I can see these things for a while, and then instantly
become blind to them. This morning the man came and told me the
magistrates had come to examine me.
Such are the principal points in Tituba's account of the origin and author
of the disturbance or "amazing feats" at Mr. Parris's house. In the main,
they are plain, direct, and seemingly true. They teach as clearly as words
ever taught anything, that "something like a man"--"a tall man with white
hair," dressed in "serge coat"--came and forced Tituba to pinch the
children at the very time when one of them was first taken sick. They
teach also that the same man appeared to Tituba several times, and was
with her on the day of her examination. The spiritual source of the first
physical manifestations which generated the great troubles at Salem
Village is thus set forth with such clearness as will command credence in
future ages, even if it shall fail to do so in this Sadducean generation.
As before stated, another record of Tituba's testimony was made by Ezekiel
Cheever, which is much less ample and particular than the one above
presented. It omits entirely several very instructive and important
parts--especially those which make known Tituba's earlier interviews with
"the man;" those which fix the exact time when he first came to her; the
exact time when Abigail was taken ill; and, more important still, those
parts which describe the assemblage of spirits at Mr. Parris's house, and
their deliberate inflictions of pains upon the children at the very time
when their disordered conditions came upon them.
Upham, by using Cheever's instead of the other account, failed to adduce
several vastly important historic facts; the special facts which are
essential to a fair presentation of the origin and nature of _Salem_
witchcraft. He nowhere recognizes the probably acute intellect, strong
powers, persistent action, and inspiring presence of the _tall man with
white hair and in serge coat_. Omitting these, he has but given us Hamlet
with Hamlet left out. And this, too, not in ignorance, for he had seen
Corwin's manuscript, which made clearly manifest the presence and doings
of one spirit-personage especially, and taught many other facts that were
not reconcilable with his theory.
The tall man with white hair who visited Tituba on the evening of January
15, 1692, has such obvious and important connection with, and influence
over, all the ostensible actors in the scenes which former witchcraft
historians have depicted, as may revolutionize their theories, and teach
the world that those expounders never traced their subject down to its
genuine base; that they built, partly at least, upon the sands of either
ignorance or misconception of the nature and actual source of what they
discussed.
There are some important differences in the two records of Tituba's
testimony, even where the words and facts must have been the same. The
following parallel passages present quite differing reports of what she
said concerning her own knowledge of the devil:--
_Cheever._ _Corwin._
"Why do you hurt these "Why do you hurt these
children?" "I do not hurt poor children? what harm
them." "Who is it then?" have they done unto you?"
"The devil, for aught I "They do no harm to me.
know." "Did you ever I no hurt them at all."
see the devil?" "The "Why have you done it?"
devil come to me, and bid "I have done nothing. I
me serve him." can't tell when the devil
works." "What! Doth
the devil tell you that he
hurts them?" "No, he
tells me nothing."
Thus Cheever makes her say that "_the devil_" came to her and bade her
serve him, while Corwin, reporting the same part of the examination makes
her say that "_the devil_" never told her anything. Further on, Corwin
makes her say, "A thing like a man told me serve him." Cheever says the
_devil_ told her thus. Tituba herself, and all the clairvoyants of that
age, preserved a distinction between the devil and the personages they
saw, heard, and talked with. But the recorders of their testimony, failing
to observe this distinction, often perverted the evidence. A comparison of
the two records throughout suggests the probability that Corwin, who is
most minute, gives the questions and answers in their original order and
sequences much more nearly than does Cheever, whose record, when compared
with the other, appears in some parts to be summings-up of several
minutes' talks into a brief sentence or two, and also gives evidence of
his taking it as obvious fact, that Tituba's "thing like a man" was the
veritable devil. This is probable, because his minutes make her say "_the
devil_ come to me, and bid me serve him," at a point in the examination
where, according to Corwin, she said _the devil_ "tells me nothing." Thus
the appearance is, that Cheever carried back in time words which _she_
subsequently applied to her "thing like a man," and on his own
authority--not hers--applied them to "the devil." In Corwin's account, her
conception of the separate individualities of "the devil" and her "thing
like a man" reveals itself clearly, and is nowhere contravened. But
Cheever, almost at the commencement of his record, and at a point where
she, according to Corwin, said the devil told her _nothing_, reports her
as then applying to _the devil_ what she a few minutes or hours afterward
applied to her "thing like a man." According to the more full and the more
trustworthy record, she at no time confessed to any interview with "_The
Devil_," though she did freely to many conversations with "the man." These
facts are important, very interesting, and instructive. As we interpret
them now, they indicate that Tituba never confessed to any intercommunings
with the devil, never charged Mrs. Good, Mrs. Osburn, or any one else with
being familiar with his Sable Majesty, but only with "a tall man, with
white hair," wearing a "serge coat."
The court before whom she was questioned, and the people around,
generally, no doubt, deemed her "thing like a man" to be the veritable
devil, as Cheever did. But the more exact recorder of her words furnishes
good grounds for belief that Tituba herself conceived otherwise. She who
was gifted with faculties which let her see, hear, and feel the actors,
apprehended that one of them at least was a disembodied human spirit;
while the spiritually blind, but physically and logically keen-eyed ones
around her, wrongfully inferred the presence of their Malignant and Mighty
Devil with her.
Some dates fixed by this witness in Corwin's account, and entirely omitted
in Cheever's, are interesting and somewhat important. We learn what, so
far as we know, escaped the notice of all former searchers, that it was on
Friday, January 15, just as she was going to sleep, that "one like a man"
came to her and appointed a meeting there at Mr. Parris's house, to take
place on the next Wednesday evening. Accordingly, on Wednesday evening,
January 20, "the man" and four women came, and then designedly and
deliberately pushed Tituba on, and made her pinch the daughter and niece
of Mr. Parris; and _on that very evening_, Abigail, at least, if not
Betty also, "_was first taken ill_." Here is an important and significant
coincidence. Just at the time when the illness was developed, spirits, in
compliance with a previous arrangement, were there present at work seeking
to produce just such a result as was manifested. Did they, or did other
agencies, produce the mysterious disorders which seemed to devil-dreading
beholders like diabolical obsessions? In view of all the facts, it is
plain that a spirit or spirits caused the children to suffer.
By failing to present the above points, which, though lacking in the
account that he copied and followed, yet came under his eye, Upham clearly
failed to use some very important historic facts which are essential to a
fair presentation of both the time at which, and the agents through whom,
Salem witchcraft had its origin, and consequently to a fair presentation
of its nature. But those facts strenuously conflict with his theory that
embodied girls and women were the designers and perpetrators of that great
and terrific manifestation of destructive forces. How strong the chains of
a pet theory! How blinding the cataracts of long-cherished conclusions!
If there exists in the world's annals more distinct testimony that a
particular individual was the deliberate and intentional producer of acts
which generated suffering, than Tituba gave that the "thing like a man,"
which came to her once "when she was about going to sleep," once "in the
lean-to chamber," once "when she was washing the room," and who, on Friday
night, appointed a place for meeting the next Wednesday night, and, with
assistants, kept his appointment, and then and there, as he had
previously announced his purpose to do, severely "hurt the children"--if
there ever was recorded testimony which more distinctly designated a
particular being as the principal in planning and enacting any scheme than
is this from Tituba, by which she designates over and over again "a tall
man with white hair," wearing "black clothes sometimes, and sometimes
serge coat of other color," as the chief executor of the strange and
momentous development of illnesses in the family of Mr. Parris, I know not
where that clearer testimony is recorded. He who ignored several very
significant parts of what Tituba said, rejected corner-stones which are
essential to the foundation of a genuinely philosophical disclosure of the
source and consequent nature of the mysteries he attempted to explain.
Tituba has been described by Upham as "indicating, in most respects, a
mind at the lowest level of general intelligence," so that any one must be
more rash than prudent who will impute to her ability to fabricate a
series of facts, all of which seem to be natural and probable in the
province of psychology.
Mr. Parris informs us that the strange sicknesses existed in his family
during several weeks before he or others had any suspicion that they might
be of diabolical origin. Tituba dates their commencement on the evening of
January 20, just six weeks before her examination. Therefore Mr. Parris's
"several weeks" may have been five at least, during which he and his wife
and their physician and friends probably studied symptoms, administered
and watched the action of medicines, and cared for the children in every
way, with as much freedom from delusion or bewildering excitement, as they
could have done in any other equal portion of their lives. Such medical
skill as then existed there, obviously had and used a very considerable
period of time, not less than four or five weeks, in which to do its best,
and yet was baffled. Its best was unavailing. We to-day perceive
sufficient cause of its failure. It was contending against a special
spirit infliction, the authors of which could either counteract,
intensify, or nullify at their pleasure, the normal action of any common
medicines or nursings. Parents, physician, and nurses no doubt witnessed
from day to day such anomalous and changeful manifestations, sequent upon
the administration of "physic," as confounded their judgments, and made
them at last suspect "an evil hand." Tituba knew the cause of the
illnesses, but probably lacked power to see and appreciate the continuous
connection of that cause with the long series of its effects. Had she
divulged her knowledge, what heed would have been given to the word of the
ignorant slave? What beatings might she not well fear if she confessed to
any dealings with invisible beings? No wonder that she kept her knowledge
to herself, till fear of her master's cane influenced her to disclose the
facts to the magistrates.
Small as Tituba's mental capacities were, she had some unusual
susceptibilities, which permitted, or rather obliged, her to possess more
knowledge of the origin and progress, and also of the nature and of the
active producer, of the distressing ailments and "amazing feats" in her
master's family, than did master, mistress, physician, and magistrates
combined. They saw--if it can be said that they saw at all--they saw only
through thick, coarse, and blurred glasses, very dimly; while she, at
times, clearly saw living actors face to face. From her we get the
testimony of a witness who learned directly through her own senses what
she stated; her testimony gives forth the ring of unflawed truth, and
lifts a vail off from long-hidden mysteries.
Hutchinson, Upham, and Drake each sought to make it apparent that mundane
roguishness, trickery, and malice, operating amid public credulity and
infatuation, prompted and enabled frail girls and women to produce the
"amazing feats," marvelous convulsions, and all the many other woeful
outworkings of witchcraft. Having been either unobservant of, or having
ignored, the plain historic fact seen over and over again in Tituba's
testimony, that certain other intelligences than girls, that minds which
were freed more or less fully and permanently from the hamperings of
flesh, actually started the first display of witchcraft pinchings, fits,
and convulsions at Salem Village, those historians wrongfully charged
girls and women, whose bodies were then the subjects and tools of other
intelligences, with being the feigners of maladies and the producers of
acts which an eye-witness and reluctant participator distinctly declares
were manifested in obedience to a will or wills not their own. Such
oversight, or such discarding of facts, whichever it may have been, caused
those writers to so restrict their stores of intelligent agents having
more or less access to and power over man, as to put outside of their own
reach and vision the actual producers of witchcraft phenomena. This
self-imposed or self-retained restriction forced upon them necessity for
efforts to show that mere children possessed gigantic physical and mental
powers and brains which concocted and executed schemes that shook to their
very foundations the strong fabrics of church and state--yes, forced them
to ascribe mighty public agitations to insignificant operators.
Tituba, on the other hand, by a simple statement of what her own interior
self saw, heard, felt, and did,--by a statement of what she actually
_knew_,--designated the genuine and the obviously competent authors of
witchcraft marvels, and explained their advent rationally. She, therefore,
by far--very far--outranks each and all of those historians as a competent
and authoritative expounder of the authorship, origin, and nature of Salem
Witchcraft. Her "something like a man"--her _tall white-haired man in
serge coat_--was its author. That man was a spirit, and his works were
Spiritualism of some quality. Opposition revealed his possession of mighty
force. And, whatever his motive, the result of his scheme was the death of
witchcraft throughout Christendom, and consequent wide emancipation from
mental slavery.
Some statements made and published by Robert Calef not long subsequent to
1692, wear on their surface the semblance of impeachments, or at least of
questionings of the value of Tituba's testimony. He says, "The first
complained of was the said Indian woman named Tituba; she confessed _the
devil_ urged her to sign a book, which he presented to her, and also to
work mischief to the children," &c. We fail to find in Corwin's report
anything like a _confession_ of any such things; she there states
distinctly that _The Devil tells her nothing_, and also that the book was
offered to her, and that the urgings to hurt the children were made to her
by "something like a man"--by "_the man_." She had no idea that the devil
was her visitant, and never confessed that he tempted her.
Calef goes on and says, "She was afterward committed to prison, and lay
there till sold for her fees. The account she since gives of it is, that
her master did beat her and otherwise abuse her to make her confess and
accuse (such as he called) her sister witches; and that whatsoever she
said by way of confessing, or accusing others, was the effect of such
usage." This is credible, and is probably true. Such proceedings on the
part of Mr. Parris are not inconsistent with the character which he bears.
Tituba's other master, the white-haired man, had charged her "to say
nothing;" she perhaps, therefore, was in fact induced to utter "whatsoever
she said by way of confessing or accusing others," by beatings she
received from her visible master. But what did she say by way of
confessing or accusing? Nothing, really. She merely stated facts known to
her; and such statement should not be misnamed either confession or
accusation.
Corwin's record of that slave's testimony excites an apprehension--yes,
generates belief--that Calef unconsciously made misleading statement when
he wrote that "she _confessed_ the _devil_ urged her to sign a book." We
have met with no indication that she ever made what should be called
_confession_. We repeat, that she quite fully narrated that she had seen,
held conversation with, and been forced to obey, a white-haired _man_, and
also that the women Good and Osburn were at times her companion operators
when the Man was present. That frank statement of facts constituted her
only confession, so far as we perceive. Had this been made by an
intelligent witness who comprehended how the public mind would interpret
it, there might be plausible reason for saying that she or he
"_confessed_." But with Tituba it was a simple statement of the truth.
We suspect that Calef, under the prevalent habit of his day, unwittingly
wrote _devil_ where Tituba, according to Corwin, said "the man." If he
followed Cheever's report of the trial, he seemed to have authority for
doing so. That Tituba regarded the devil and "the tall man" as two
distinct individuals is very obvious. When questioned, she admitted that
the devil _might_ hurt the children for aught she knew, but she had never
seen _him_, nor had _he_ ever told her anything. She had no acquaintance
with that personage. While the questions related to _his_ doings she could
give no information; but as soon as opportunity was given her to introduce
her "tall man" she was ready to speak of him freely and instructively. The
people around her, not interiorly illumined, applied the name _devil_ to
any disembodied intelligence that acted upon, or whose power became
manifest to, their external senses; not so did either Tituba or any of her
clairvoyant sister sufferers or sister _accusers_ either. Throughout the
whole of her two days' rigid examination she persistently called her
strange visitant "the man." And it is a significant fact that all the
mediumistic ones then, both accusers and accused, escaped ever falling
into the prevalent habit of accusing THE DEVIL. Other agents met their
vision.
Fear of Mr. Parris may have forced Tituba to tell her true tale, which but
for him she might have withheld. But is there probability either that he
dictated any part of her testimony, or that she fabricated anything? We
see none. The fair and just presumption is, that though forced to speak,
she simply described what she had seen, and narrated what she had
experienced. The apparent promptness, directness, and general consistency
of her answers, strongly favor that presumption. In her judgment, as in
ours, what she said was no confession of familiarity with the devil, for
she disclaimed any knowledge of him; and therefore she made no confession
of witchcraft as then defined, and no accusation of it against the other
women.
Calef imputes to her a subsequent position which may be so construed as to
indicate that she declined to stand by her previous statements. He says,
"her master refused to pay her" jail "fees," and thus liberate her from
prison, "unless she would stand to what she had said." In that quotation
is involved all that we find in the older records which wears even a
semblance of impeaching her testimony, or suggests any reason why we
should distrust its intentional accuracy in any particular. The master did
not pay the fees. She "lay in jail thirteen months, and was then sold to
pay her prison charges." (Drake. Annals, 190.) But what did her master
require her to "stand to"? Calef says he beat her "to make her confess,
and accuse [such as he called] her sister witches; and that whatsoever
she did by way of _confessing_ or _accusing_ others, was the effect of
such usage." What she may have confessed to having done, or what she may
have accused others of doing, at other times than when she was under
examination, we do not know. Her statements then, as she then meant, and
as we now understand them, fell far short of confessing familiarity with
the devil, or of laying that crime to any others; therefore she neither
made herself nor her companions _witches_. Still her master, no doubt, as
did the recorder Ezekiel Cheever and the court, understood her as meaning
_devil_ when she said "the man," though she herself did not so mean. Even
Corwin, apparently, as judge, put the prevalent construction upon her
words, though his fidelity as a recorder caused him to write "the man"
when she said "the man." This general habit of understanding _devil_, when
some other personage was both named and meant, enables us to see that
there may have been subsequent dispute between her and her master as to
her real meaning, and that he made it a condition for her liberation that
she should put his construction upon what she had said, rather than her
own. It is an open question whether she ever refused to stand by her own
meaning, or the true meaning of her own words. Perhaps she did refuse to
stand by construction which the faith and habit of the day led most minds
to put upon her words unjustifiably; but we doubt whether she refused to
stand by the literal and intended meaning of what she had said.
Poor Tituba! Because of your forced connection with a scheme and works
which entirely baffled your comprehension, because of your forced
disclosure of things you had witnessed and experienced behind the vail of
flesh, your own body was imprisoned thirteen months, and two innocent
women were doomed to death. Guileless and innocent, so far as connected
with witchcraft, you was borne on by mighty forces to seem to act
voluntarily, though in fact unwillingly and perforce, a prominent part in
one of the most fearful scenes in human history. Man's ignorance of
spiritual agents and forces in your day, together with the prevalent
hallucination devil-ward, made you a humble and pitiable martyr to simple
truth-telling. Some seeds in your simple story now gathered from out the
chaff that has covered them for nine-score years, may soon be scattered
over New England soil, from which, we trust, you above, and men below, may
gather wholesome fruits of justice and truth.