Satanism Today - An Encyclopedia of Religion, Folklore and Popular ...

168 Mather, Cotton
series of crises that were to bring about an end to
their “Holy Experiment,” at least in the form envisioned
by the original founders. Internally, the
often bitter debate over church membership that
led to the so-called halfway covenant of 1662 was
but one aspect of a breakdown in consensus that
was reflected in commercial competition, political
contention, and personal bad feelings.
Externally, English kings began to assume
control over their Massachusetts colonies, most
distressingly during the reign of Charles II. But
even after Charles was deposed, the colony knew
that it would never again enjoy the autonomy of
its first half century. On top of these troubles, New
England experienced a devastating Indian war in
1675–1677 (King Philip’s War) that left the
colonists burdened with debts.
Cotton Mather, son of Increase Mather and
grandson of John Cotton, was the most brilliant
representative of New England Puritanism at a
time when the older Puritan hegemony was beginning
to break down. Born in the year following the
adoption of the halfway covenant (allowing children
of “saved” church members to be members),
Mather was prominently involved in the official
response to the witchcraft outbreak of 1692.
Mather was also involved in the process of idealizing
the colony’s earliest period until it became a
kind of golden age. Like his father, he perceived his
lax contemporaries as having become
“Indianized,” and called on New Englanders to
abandon their “Indian vices” and return to the
model of the past. Also like his father and other
Puritan leaders, Cotton Mather saw New
England’s various afflictions as punishment for its
deviations from the covenant—their “contract”
with God. For example, in the sixth chapter of
Magnalia Christi Americana he repeatedly asserted
that the depredations of the Indian savages were
God’s just punishments for the colony’s “apostasie”:
“In the things that have been done to our
captives, the great ‘Lord of Hosts’ hath dealt with
us as generals used to do upon the sedition and
mutiny of military legions: He makes a sort of
decimation among the offenders, and by what he
does to some, he declares he might justly do to all
the rest.” Although Cotton stopped just short of
identifying Native Americans with evil spirits
(despite his use of expressions like “devils incarnate”
to describe American Indians), he clearly
understood the “unconverted savages” to be under
the direct rule of Satan.
Two colonies of churches being brought forth,
and a third conceived within the bounds of
New-England, by the year 1636, it was time
for the devil to take the alarum, and make
some attempt in opposition to the possession
which the Lord Jesus Christ was going to have
of these “utmost parts of the earth.” These
parts were then covered with nations of
barbarous Indians and infidels, in whom the
“prince of the power of the air” did “work in
spirit”; nor could it be expected that nations
of wretches, whose whole religion was the
most explicit sort of devil-worship, should
not be acted by the devil to engage in some
early and bloody action, for the extinction of
a plantation so contrary to his interests, as
that of New-England was. (Mather 1820, 552)
Later in the same paragraph, Mather refers to
the Indian nations as constituting the “kingdom of
Satan.” That this association between Indians and
Satan is more than mere hyperbole is evident in
his account of the exorcism of Mercy Short. The
devil who tormented this young woman turned
out to be a short, dark man of “an Indian colour.”
Short also described her tormentor’s companions
as “French Canadiens [i.e., Catholics] and Indian
Sagamores”—people who, according to Mather’s
account, colluded with New England witches for
the purpose of ruining New England. Perhaps
because Short had only recently been returned
from being held captive by Indians, Mather tended
to perceive her possession—her “Captivity to
Spectres,” as he called it—as being a variant on
Indian captivity. In any event, both were portrayed
as demonic captivities.
Mather was the most prominent clerical
defender of the infamous Salem witchcraft trials
of 1692, and was especially active in efforts to alleviate
the afflictions of some of the young girls who
were being “tormented” by specters that were
presumed to be acting under the direction of
witches. The first people to be identified and