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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A50139	Memorable providences relating to witchcrafts and possessions a faithful account of many wonderful and surprising things that have befallen several bewitched and possesed person in New-England, particularly a narrative of the marvellous trouble and releef experienced by a pious family in Boston, very lately and sadly molested with evil spirits : whereunto is added a discourse delivered unto a congregation in Boston on the occasion of that illustrious providence : as also a discourse delivered unto the same congregation on the occasion of an horrible self-murder committed in the town : with an appendix in vindication of a chapter in a late book of remarkable providences from the calumnies of a Quaker at Pen-silvania / written by Cotton Mather ... and recommended by the ministers of Boston and Charleston.	Mather, Cotton, 1663-1728.	1689 (1689)	Wing M1123; ESTC W479486	78,489	164

of Remarkable Providences by one Keith in a sort of a thing newly published at Pen-silvania have made it necessary for me not only to explain my self but to defend him upon the occasion that is now before me As for what I have related concerning the strange liberty which the Devils gave unto Iohn Goodwin's Children to enjoy both the Writings and the Meetings of the Quakers when offers thereof were it may be too needlessly made unto to them I need only acquaint the world that I shall procuce good legal sufficient Evidence to Confront what I do Affirm whenever any man shall demand it of me And that the Books with which the Tyral happned to he made were more than one and such as the Quickers give as general an Allowance to as to their own Primers and their Catechisms But undoubtedly the matchless Candour and Sweetness of the Quakers will inspire them with Inclinations to give me some of their public Thanks for the notice I have taken of them and in the mean time I must let my Neighbours understand what ridiculous as well as odious Calumnies the Quakers have bestowed upon my absent Father for his being an Historian they think unto their Prejudice One would think That if an Historian did but secure his Veracity from being Impeached most of his other Faults were pardonable and so truly they would be accounted by any besides Quakers who are a people by themselves But my Father had published a Book entituled Illustrious Providences in one part of which he has a Narrative of several very marvellous Occurrences that certain deluded and possessed Quakers in this Countrey were concerned in The matter of Fāts never could be dispured yet one Keith a Quaker who had been compassing 〈…〉 und to make pr●selytes visits New-Eng in his progress where meeting with small Applause less Success instead of Converts he picks up what Quarrels our Countrey could afford him and among the Rest this book of Providences At his Return to Pen-silvania he blesses the world with a little Volumn of Haeresies and Blasphemies against the Protestant Religion the principle Articles whereof he endeavours to undermine with some farther Improvements of Nonsense than the Abilities of the Quakers had heretofore help'd 'em to but tho t is almost pitty that any Eagle pardon the Comparison he himself calls us Night-birds should lose his time by attending the motions of such a Fly yet I suppose he will not be long without the Castigations of a full tho' short Answer to the Ipertinences with which he has been craftily assaving to spoyl out Vines He entitles his Harrangues The Churches in New-England brought to the Test and it might be expected that one so willing to be a Servant of those Churches as Increase Mather would not escape the Vengeance of those whom these Churches are an eye-sore unto Accordingly the Title-page of his Discourses for truly-Reader he will not now give us a Silent Meeting promises to us An Answer to the gross Abuses Lyes and Slanders of Increase Mather which he afterwards detects just as one of his Predecessours after a Con●ersation with Hogishead Trampled upon Plato's pride while he cannot instance in any one Abuse Lye or Slander of Increase Mather without committing more than a few himself However he is pleas'd to say when he comes to talk Let any of his kindred answer for him in his absence and because I am somewhat a kin to the said Increase Mather whom the Ani-mad-versions of this Keith have made such an Assault upon that were I more dumb than the Son of Croesus himself yet I must have spoken at the Provocation I am willing to satisfie our little Authour so far as to Answer these Three Things upon him Yet I would so far observe one of Solomon's Rules in my Answer as not to use upon him some Terms of his Art which as a Specimen of his breeding he bestows upon Increase Mather but offer a few just Reflections on this new Apostle no doubt a Successor to one of the old ones unto the world First He charges my absent Father with Gross Abuses Lyes and Slanders and yet he denies not the Truth of the Stories the Resation of which flings him into this foaming Rage He charges him just as last year he did the rest of the Ministers of Boston He sent us a written Challenge which begins I being well assured by the Spirit of God that the Doctrine ye preach to the People is false and he then reckons up Twelve Articles he says of our Doctrine the Twelfth of which is directly contrary to what we assert and maintain and preach every day This was his Inspiration then and such is his Narration now Increase Mather penns Truths and yet it seems writes Lyes But where is Increase Mather's Crime Why our Animadvertor tells us I. M. relates these stories on purpose to abuse the honest and sober people called Quakers without making any Distinction But what Metal is this man's Forehead made of Reader you shall find my Fathers introduction to his Histories to be All wise men that are acquainted therewith observe the blasting rebukes of Heaven upon the late SINGING and Dancing Quakers And his Inference from them is That The Quakers are SOME of them undoubtedly possessed with evil spirits and his Conclusion is We may by this judge whose servants the Singing Quakers are Behold how carefully he has Repeated the very Distinction which this waspish man complains at the Omission of Besides he had no need of making any Distinction at all That the Quakers fall out among themselves is but a natural Consequence of their Tempers and Errours which cannot be otherwise than Incohaerent and sometimes their Credit forces them to Explode in one a-another what they wish they could but can't Excuse Tho it seems if a Woman dress her self like a Devil and fright some of her Sex almost out of their Lives on a Lords Day in one of our biggest Assemblies G. K. can here canonize her for a Saint Case's Crew are substantially of the same Drove with Keith's Crue both Mad tho with some variety of Application in their Phrensies What if those Ranters and these Quakers be shaken together in a Bag 'T is a more allowable method of Sorting that of this G. K.'s who would make us a Crew of Ranters because we hold That God hath fore-ordained infallibly and unchangeably whatever comes to pass And whereas our Answerer tells us that when those horrid monsters were whipt at Plimouth for their wonderful hideous Devilism Some of the honest people called Quakers openly declared before the people that the Quakers did not at all own them to he of their Society I am to ask him Who of this honest people then it was That then declared them to be The dear Children of God But Reader pray observe Tho he will not leave Urging that for a Quaker to be Possessed is no more than for a Presbyterian or an Independent so

have no right Impressions by these Memorable Providences made upon his mind yet I hope those that know what it is to be sober will not repent any pains that they may have taken in perusing what Records of these Witchcrafts Possessions I thus leave unto Posterity POSTSCRIPT YOU have seen the Trouble and the Relief of Iohn Goodwins Children After which the Daemons were let loose to make a fresh Attacque upon them tho not in a manner altogether so terrible afflictive as what they had before susteined All the Three Children were visited with some Return of their Calamities but the Boy was the Child which endured most in this New Assault He had been for some While kindly entertained with Mr. Baily at Watertown where he had enjoyed a long time of ease the Devils having given him but little Disburbance except what was for a short while after his first coming there He no sooner came Home but he began to be ill again with diverse peculiar Circumstances attending of him There was this particularly remarkable That the Boy dream't he had a Bone within his skin growing cross his Ribs and when he awaked he felt and found a thing there which was esteem'd a Bone by them that handled it only every one wondered how it should be lodged there An expert Chirurgeon Dr. Iohn Clark being advis'd with about it very dexterously took it out and it prov'd not the imagined Bone but a considerable Pin a brass Pin which could not possibly have come to ly there as it did withont the Prestigious Conveyance of a Misterious Witchcraft Another time on a Lord's Day his Father would have taken him to Meeting with him and when his Father spoke of going to some of the Assemblies in the Town particularly both the North and the South the Boy would be cast into such Tortures and Postures that he would sooner Dy than go out of doors but if his Father spoke of going to others of the Assemblies in the Town particularly the Quakers the boy in a moment would be as well as could be The tryal of this was more than five times repeated and were it fully related would be more than ten times Admired Our Prayers for the Children were justly renewed and I hope not altogether unanswered Upon one Prayer over two of them they had about a Fortnights ease and their Ails again returning Prayer was again awakened with some Circumstances not proper to be exposed unto the World. God gave a present Abatement hereupon to the Maladies of the Children and caused their Invaders to retire so that by degrees they were fully and quickly Delivered Two days of Prayer obtained the Deliverance of two The Third namely the Boy Remaining under some Annoyance by the evil spirits a third Day was employ'd for him and he soon found the blessed effects of it in his Deliverance There were several very memorable things attending this Deliverance of the Children and the Vowes and the Pleas used in the Prayers which were thereby answerd but they were all Private yea in a sort Secret Non est Religio ubi omnia patent and I understand for I have some Acquaintance with him That the Friend of the Children whom God gave to be thus concerned and successful for them desires me not to let Reports of those things go out of the Walls of a Study but to leave them rather for the Notice of the other World. I think it will not be improper to tell the World that one thing in the Childrens Deliverance was the strange Death of an horrible old Woman who was presum'd to have a great hand in their Affliction Before her Death at it the Alms-House where she lived was terrified with fearful noises and she seem'd to have her Death hastened by dismal Blowes reveived from the invisible World. But having mentioned this all that I have now to publish is That Prayer and Faith was the thing which drove the Divels from the Children and I am to bear this Testimony unto the world That the Lord is nigh to all them who call upon him in truth and That blessed are all they that wait for Him. Finished Iune 7th 1689. MANTISSA TO the foregoing Narrative we have added an account given us by the Godly Father of these Haunted Children who upon his Reading over so much of our History as was written of their Exercise before their full deliverance was willing to express his Attestation to the Truth of it with this further Declaration of the Sense which he had of the unusual Miseries that then lay upon his Family 'T is in his own Style but I suppose a Pen hath not commonly been managed with more cleanly Discourse by an Hand used only to the Trowel and his Condition hath been such that he may fairly have Leave to speak IN the year 1688. about Midsummer it pleased the Lord to visit one of my children with a sore Visitation and she was not only tormented in her Body but was in great distress of Mind Crying out That she was in the dark concerning her Souls estate and that she had mispent her precious time She and we thinking her time was near at an end Hearing those Shrieks and Groans which did not only pierce the ears but Hearts of her poor Parents now was a time for me to Consider with my self and to look into my own heart and and life and see how matters did there stand between God and my own soul and see Wherefore the Lord was thus contending with me And upon Enquiry I found cause to judge my self to justify the Lord. This Affliction continuing some time the Lord saw good then to double the affliction in smiting down another Child and that which was most heart breaking of all and did double this double affliction was it was apparent and judged by all that saw them that the Devil and his Instruments had a hand in it The consideration of this was most dreadful I thought of what David said 2 Sam. 24. 14. if he feared so to fall into the hands of Men oh then to think of the Horror of our condition to be in the Hands of Devils and Witches This our doleful condition moved us to call to our Friends to have pity on us for Gods Hand had touched us I was ready to say that no ones affliction was like mine That my little House that should be a little Bethel for God to dwell in should be made a Den for Devils that those little Bodies that should be Temples for the Holy Ghost to dwell in should be thus harrassed and abused by the Devil and his cursed Brood But how this twice doubled affliction is doubled again Two more of my Children are smitten down oh the Cries the Shrieks the Tortures of these poor Children Doctors cannot help Parents weep and lament over them but cannot ease them Now I considering my affliction to be more than ordinary it did certainly call for more than ordinary Prayer I