Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Prologue
- Introduction
- 1 Magical Experiments: Divining, Healing, and Destroying in Seventeenth-Century New England
- 2 The Serpent that Lies in the Grass Unseen: Clerical and Lay Opposition to Magic
- 3 Entertaining Satan: Sin, Suffering, and Countermagic
- 4 Sinful Curiosity: Astrological Discourse in Early New England
- 5 Insufficient Grounds of Conviction: Witchcraft, the Courts, and Countermagic
- 6 Rape of a Whole Colony: The 1692 Witch Hunt
- Epilogue
- Appendix A Witchcraft Trials in Seventeenth-Century New England (Excluding Persons Accused During the Salem Witch Hunt)
- Appendix B Persons Accused During the Salem Witch Hunt
- Name Index
- Subject Index
2 - The Serpent that Lies in the Grass Unseen: Clerical and Lay Opposition to Magic
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 October 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Prologue
- Introduction
- 1 Magical Experiments: Divining, Healing, and Destroying in Seventeenth-Century New England
- 2 The Serpent that Lies in the Grass Unseen: Clerical and Lay Opposition to Magic
- 3 Entertaining Satan: Sin, Suffering, and Countermagic
- 4 Sinful Curiosity: Astrological Discourse in Early New England
- 5 Insufficient Grounds of Conviction: Witchcraft, the Courts, and Countermagic
- 6 Rape of a Whole Colony: The 1692 Witch Hunt
- Epilogue
- Appendix A Witchcraft Trials in Seventeenth-Century New England (Excluding Persons Accused During the Salem Witch Hunt)
- Appendix B Persons Accused During the Salem Witch Hunt
- Name Index
- Subject Index
Summary
They say, that in some Towns it has been a usual thing for People to cure Hurts with Spells, or to use detestable Conjurations, with Sieves, Keys, and Pease, and Nails, and Horseshoes, and I know not what other Implements, to learn the things for which they have a forbidden, and an impious Curiosity. 'Tis in the Devils Name, that such things are done; and in Gods Name I do this day charge them, as vile Impieties.
Cotton Mather, Wonders of the Invisible WorldOn 2 May 1687, Joseph Beacon was lying in bed. In retrospect, Beacon could not be sure whether he was asleep or awake, but he suspected the latter. As he lay there, he saw an apparition of his brother, who lived in London, “distanced from him a thousand Leagues.” The apparition appeared at about five o'clock in the morning. Beacon saw that his brother's “Countenance was very Pale, G[h]astly, Deadly, and he had a bloody wound on one side of his Fore-head.” Understandably “Affrighted,” he cried out, “What's the matter, Brother? How came you here!” The apparition replied, “Brother, I have been most barbarously and injuriously Butchered, by a Debauched Drunken Fellow, to whom I never did any wrong in my Life.”
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- Chapter
- Information
- The Devil's DominionMagic and Religion in Early New England, pp. 55 - 84Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1992