New Char

sachusetts.

1692.

THE Revolution in England forms an epoch in American ter of Mas- history. The effects of it were the most sensibly felt in the colony of Massachusetts. When the colonists resumed their charter in 1689, they earnestly solicited its re-establishment, with the addition of some necessary powers; but the king could not be prevailed on to consent to that measure, and a new charter was obtained. Sir William Phips arrived at Boston in May, May 14. Arrival of with this charter, and a commission, constituting him governor.1 SirW.Phips He was soon after conducted from his house to the town house as governor. by the regiment of Boston, the militia companies of Charlestown, the magistrates, ministers, and principal gentlemen of Boston and the adjacent towns. The charter was first published, and then the governor's commission. The venerable old charter governor Bradstreet next resigned the chair. After the lieutenant governor's commission was published, the oaths were administered; and the new government thus became organized.

Govern

ment organ

ized.

Difference

The province, designated by the new charter, contained the between the whole of the old Massachusetts colony, to which were added the new and the colony of Plymouth, the province of Maine, the province of Nova old charter, Scotia, and all the country between the province of Maine and in regard to the extent Nova Scotia, as far northward as the river St. Lawrence, also of the prov- Elizabeth islands, and the islands of Nantucket and Martha's

ince;

the governor;

Vineyard. Under the old charter, all the magistrates and officers of state were chosen annually by the general assembly; by the new charter, the appointment of the governor, lieutenant governor, secretary, and all the officers of the admiralty, was vested in the crown. Under the old charter, the governor had little more share in the administration than any one of the assistants. He had the power of calling the general court; but he

England without his knowledge, and he, by the king's order, detained, he fell into a fever, and died in a few days. He well understood the learned languages; spoke Latin fluently and elegantly; was well versed in all the liberal arts and sciences; "was a great master in physic and alchymy, and no stranger to any part of polite or useful learning. He was also eminent for charity to the poor, and bountifully contributed to the Hungarian ministers when they took refuge in England." Calamy. Among his numerous publications, are, Account of Solomon's Temple, folio; a Latin tract, De Excidio Antichristi; three Sermons in Morning Exercises; the Visibility of the true Church; Israel Redur, including a piece by Dr. G. Fletcher, to show that the Tartars are the posterity of the ten Tribes of Israel. Among the MSS. preserved in the British Museum there is one of Samuel Lee, entitled, " Answer to many Queries relative to America, chiefly to the Natural Productions and Diseases. 1690." Biblioth. Americana, 30.

1 The king complimented the New England agents for the first time with the nomination of their governor; and they agreed to nominate Sir William Phips. The commission constituted him captain general over the colonies of Connecticut and Rhode Island. In the last of these colonies the authority was attempted to be exercised; but without effect. Hutchinson.

ants;

could not adjourn, prorogue, or dissolve it. To such acts the 1692. vote of the major part of the whole court was necessary. The governor gave commissions to civil and military officers; but all such officers were elected by the court. Under the new charter, there was to be an annual meeting of the general court on the last Wednesday in May; but the governor might discretionally call an assembly at any other times, and adjourn, prorogue, and dissolve it at pleasure. No act of government was to be valid without his consent. He had, with the consent of the council, the sole appointmeut of all military officers, and of all officers belonging to the courts of justice. Other civil officers were elected by the two houses; but the governor had a negative on the choice. No money could issue out of the treasury, but by his warrant, with the advice and consent of the council. Under the assistthe old charter, the assistants or counsellors were elected by the votes of all the freemen in the colony; and were not only, with the governor, one of the two branches of the legislature, but the supreme executive court in all civil and criminal causes, excepting those cases where, by the laws, an appeal to the general court was allowed. The new charter provided, that, on the last Wednesday of May annually, 28 counsellors should be newly chosen by the general court or assembly. The representatives, the repreunder the old charter, were elected by freemen only. Under sentatives; the new charter, every freeholder, of forty shillings sterling a year, was a voter, and every other inhabitant who had £40 sterling personal estate. The new charter contained nothing of an ecclesiastical constitution. With the exception of Papists, liberty the church, of conscience, which was not mentioned in the first charter, was by the second expressly granted to all. Writs having been immediately issued on the governor's arrival, the general court First genermet on the 8th of June. An act was then passed, declaring, that all the laws of the colony of Massachusetts bay and the colony of New Plymouth, not being repugnant to the laws of England, nor inconsistent with the charter, should be in force, in the respective colonies, until the 10th of November, 1692, excepting where other provision should be made by act of assembly.2

al court.

A strange infatuation had already begun to produce misery Witchcraft. in private families, and disorder throughout the community. The imputation of withcraft was accompanied with a prevalent belief of its reality; and the lives of a considerable number of innocent people were sacrificed to blind zeal, and superstitious cre

1 The construction, given to the terms "general court or assembly," was, that it included the whole three branches.

2 Hutchinson, ii. 5-15. Adams, N. Eng. 156, 157. Dummer, N. Eng. Charters, 3. The Charter of William and Mary is printed with the Laws of Massachusetts (Col.) 1759; in Neal's Hist. of New England; and in the Memoires de l'Amerique, ii. 593–641.

1

1692. dulity. The mischief began at Salem in February; but it soon extended into various parts of the colony. The contagion, however, was principally within the county of Essex. Before the close of September, 19 persons were executed, and one pressed to death, all of whom asserted their innocence.1

This part of the history of our country furnishes an affecting proof of the imbecility of the human mind, and of the powerful influence of the passions. The culture of sound philosophy, and the dissemination of useful knowledge, have a happy tendency to repress chimerical theories, with their delusive and miserable effects.2 The era of English learning had scarcely commenced.

1 Coll. Mass. Hist. Soc. v. 76. Hutchinson, ii. 59. Calef, Part v. Giles Cory, refusing to plead, had judgment of peine fort et dure for standing mute, and was pressed to death; the only instance of this barbarous punishment that ever has occurred in New England. More than a hundred women, many of them of fair characters and of the most reputable families, in the towns of Salem, Beverly, Andover, Billerica, and other towns, were apprehended, examined, and generally committed to prison. No person was safe. What Montesquieu says of the Greeks, in the time of the emperor Theodorus Lascaris, might be applied here: "A person ought to have been a magician to be able to clear himself of the imputation of magic. Such was the excess of their stupidity, that, to the most dubious crime in the world, they joined the most uncertain proofs." Spirit of Laws, b. 12. c. 5. A contemporary writer observes: "As to the method which the Salem Justices do take in their examinations, it is truly this: A warrant being issued out to apprehend the persons that are charged and complained of by the afflicted children, as they are called; said persons are brought before the justices, the afflicted being present. The justices ask the apprehended why they afflict those poor children; to which the apprehended answer, they do not afflict them. The justices order the apprehended to look upon the said children, which accordingly they do; and at the time of that look (I dare not say by that look, as the Salem gentlemen do), the afflicted are cast into a fit. The apprehended are then blinded, and ordered to touch the afflicted; and at that touch, though not by that touch (as above), the afflicted do ordinarily come out of their fits. The afflicted persons then declare and affirm, that the apprehended have afflicted them; upon which the apprehended persons, though of never so good repute, are forthwith committed to prison, on suspicion for witchcraft." Letter of Thomas Brattle, F. R. S. dated October 8, 1692, in Coll. Mass. Hist. Soc. v. 61-80; which gives an account of this delusion, that is worthy of a judicious man and a philosopher.

2"Our forefathers looked upon nature with more reverence and horror, before the world was elightened by learning and philosophy; and loved to astonish themselves with the apprehensions of withcraft, prodigies, charms, and enchantments. There was not a village in England that had not a ghost in it; the church yards were all haunted; every large common had a circle of fairies belonging to it; and there was scarcely a shepherd to be met with, who had not seen a spirit." ADDISON, Spectator, vi. No. 419. Sir William Temple, in his Essay on Poetry, remarks: "How much of this credulity remained, even to our own age, may be observed by any man that reflects so far as 30 or 40 years; how often avouched, and how generally credited were the stories of Fairies, Sprites, witchcrafts, and enchantments! In some part of France, and not longer ago, the common people believed certainly there were Longaroos, or men turned into wolves; and I remember several Irish of the same mind. The remainders [of the Gothic Runes or Verses, to which all sorts of charms were attributed] are woven into our very language. Mara in old Runic was a Goblin that seized upon men asleep in their beds, and took from them all speech and motion. Old Nicka was a sprite who came to strangle people when they fell into the Bo was a fierce Gothic captain, son of Odin, whose name was used by the soldiers when they would fright or surprise their enemies."

water.

BRITISH COLONIES.

Laws then existed in England against witches; and the authority 1692. of Sir Matthew Hale, who was revered in New England, not only for his knowledge in the law, but for his gravity and piety, had doubtless great influence. The trial of the witches in Suffolk in England was published in 1684; and there was so exact a resemblance between the Old England demons and the New, that, it can hardly be doubted, the arts of the designing were borrowed, and the credulity of the populace augmented, from the parent country. The gloomy state of New England probably facilitated the delusion; for "superstition flourishes in times. of danger and dismay." The distress of the colonists, at this time, was great. The sea coast was infested with privateers. The inland frontiers east and west were continually harassed by the French and Indians. The abortive expedition to Canada had exposed the country to the resentment of France, the effects of which were perpetually dreaded, and at the same time had incurred a heavy debt.2 The old charter was gone; and what which was very reluctantevils would be introduced by the ly received by many, time only could determine, but fear might forebode.

new,

How far these causes, operating in a wilderness that was scarcely cleared up, might have contributed toward the infatuation, it is difficult to determine. It were injurious, however, to consider New England as peculiar in this culpable credulity, with its sanguinary effects; for more persons have been put to death for witchcraft in a single county in England in a short space of time, than have suffered, for the same cause, in all New England since its first settlement.3

Although the trials on indictment for witchcraft were prosecuted the subsequent year, yet no execution appears to have taken place. Time gradually detected the delusion. Persons in high stations, and of irreproachable characters, were at length accused. The spectral evidence was no longer admitted. The

During the civil wars 1 Home's Sketches of the History of Man, iv. 255. of France and England, superstition was carried to extravagance. Every one believed in magic, charms, spells, sorcery, and witchcraft.'

2 Hutchinson, ii. 12.

3 Hutchinson, ii. 16. Blackstone [Comment. b. 4. c. 4.], having stated the evidence on both sides of the question concerning the reality of witchcraft, observes, "it seems to be the most eligible way to conclude, that in general there has been such a thing as witchcraft, though one cannot give credit to any particular modern instance of it." He also observes, that "the acts against witchcraft and sorcery continued in force till lately, to the terror of all ancient females in the kingdom: And many poor wretches were sacrificed thereby to the prejudice of their neighbours, and their own illusions; not a few having, by some means or other, confessed the fact at the gallows. But all executions for this dubious crime are now at an end." The statute 9 Geo. II. ch. 5, enacts, that no prosecution shall for the future be carried on against any person for conjuration, witchcraft, sorcery, or enchantment. Ibid. See Grahame, U. S. i. b. 2. c. 5.

1692. voice of Reason was heard; and all who had been imprisoned were set at liberty.1

Rights asserted.

The general court of Massachusetts, proceeding in its legislative duties, passed an act, which was a kind of Magna Charta. Among the general privileges which it asserted, it declared, "No aid, tax, tallage, assessment, custom, loan, benevolence or imposition whatsoever, shall be laid, assessed, imposed or levied on any of their majesties' subjects or their estates, on any pretence whatsoever, but by the act and consent of the governor, council and representatives of the people, assembled in general court.”2

1 Calef, More Wonders of the Invisible World; particularly Part v, which gives "A short Historical Account of matters of fact in that affair." Hutchinson, ii. 15-62. Adams, N. Eng. 160-165. Morse and Parish, N. Eng. c. 23. At the court in January, the grand jury found bills against about 50 for witchcraft; but, on trial, they were all acquitted, excepting three of the worst characters, and those the governor reprieved for the king's mercy. All who were not brought upon trial he ordered to be discharged. Hutchinson. "The conclusion of the whole, in the Massachusetts colony, was, Sir William Phips governor being called home, before he went he pardoned such as had been condemned, for which they gave about 30 shillings each to the king's attorney." Calef. It is but just to observe, that many of the ministers and principal men in the colony disbelieved the charges at the time, and discountenanced the judicial proceedings. Several persons, who had served as Jurors in the trials at Salem, afterward publicly confessed their error, and asked forgiveness. Judge Sewall, who was one of the court at those trials, and concurred in the sentences of condemnation, made a public confession several years afterward. I find these entries in his MS. Diary. " April 11, 1692. Went to Salem, where in the meeting house the persons accused of witchcraft were examined; was a very great assembly-'twas awfull to see how the afflicted persons were agitated." But in the margin is written with a tremulous hand, probably on a subsequent review, the lamenting Latin interjection, Væ, væ, væ! "Decr. 24. [1696.]

Sam. recites to me in Latin Mat. 12 from the 6th. to the end of the 12th v. The 7th. verse did awfully bring to my mind the Salem Trajedie." A procla mation was issued by the government of Massachusetts 17 Decemb. 1696, appointing the 14th of January to be observed as a day of Prayer and Fasting throughout the Province. The Proclamation took particular notice of "the late tragedy, raised among us by Satan and his instruments, through the awful judgment of God;" and inculcated humiliation and supplication for pardon. Historians mention a penitential paper, given on the day of the Fast by Judge Sewall to his minister (Mr. Willard), who read it in the congregation; but they do not accurately state its purport. It is preserved in his Diary, where it nearly fills a quarto page. It expresses a deep sense of "guilt contracted upon the opening of the late Commission of Oyer and Terminer at Salem (to which the order for this day relates)," and asks pardon of God and man.

2 Hutchinson, ii. 64, 65. Bradford, Mass. i. 17, 269. The other parts of the act were copied from the English Magna Charta; but this act, and an act for punishing capital offenders, with several other acts, were soon disallowed. Many acts, however, which were then passed, were approved, viz. one for prevention of frauds and perjuries; others for punishing criminal offences, in many parts mitigating the penalties at common law; for the observation of the Lord's day; solemnizing marriages by a minister or a justice of peace; settlement and support of ministers and schoolmasters; regulating towns and counties; requiring the oaths appointed instead of the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, as also the oaths of officers; establishing fees; ascertaining the number and regulating the house of representatives; settlement of the estates of persons dying intestate; and divers other acts of immediate necessity and general utility.