Word: mathers
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...Increase Mather's conscience worked slowly, it at least worked surely. All through the summer, with the witchcraft mania reaching new heights, his doubts began to grow. The earliest sign of his increasing distrust of the trial procedures came in the middle of June when, with several other ministers, he responded to a request for advice from the judges. The group of ministers suggested that the courts evaluate carefully the so-called "spectral evidence"--that given by the afflicted girls of Salem; no one was quite ready yet to dispute directly the testimony of the girls, but their conduct...
...children had been bewitched. After all, everyone know the power of the Devil and no one doubted the existence of witches. Does not the Bible say: "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live."? And had not one of the most learned men of the day, the eminent Cotton Mather, recently published a voluminous work on the evidences of witchcraft...
Then, on the evening of May 14, 1692, a ship docked in Boston Harbor. The sturdy figure of the Reverend Increase Mather, President of Harvard College, strode ashore, accompanied by Sir William Phips, newly-appointed governor of the Massachusetts Bay colony. For four long years, Mather had been in England, leading the fight to secure a new charter for the colony. At last his mission had ended and he was ready to resume his Harvard duties again, as well as his numerous ministerial tasks...
...colony to which Mather now returned was in a turmoil over the great witch-hunt, which continued unabated; still no voice of authority had been raised against the trials. It would be pleasant to report that Increase Mather immediately flamed with indignation at the witchcraft craze, but the issue hardly seemed to rouse him at first. His long-neglected duties at Harvard absorbed his attention and he apparently saw no reason to question the verdicts of the duly-constituted authorities of the colony, men for the most part trained and educated at Harvard College...
According to an Ohio paper, the protest followed a speech in nearby Middletown, where a research specialist for the Legion had bitterly attacked Mather...