America has a history that has been dark and disturbing at times. People have been oppressed and persecuted for their beliefs, their religion, their color, and their sex. It is sometimes hard for young people to understand or appreciate the significance and importance of remembering our past. One such dark time occurred during the sixteen hundreds in Massachusetts. Cotton Mather was a leading Puritan religious leader who was responsible for many positive scientific advances, but is primarily remembered as a leading proponent of the dangers of witchcraft.
Mather did many fine things during his lifetime and was a prodigious writer. One of his works, "Memorable Providences", recounts a defining moment in his religious life. He was apparently called upon by a mason to evaluate the disturbing behavior of that person's children. They were experiencing terrible aches and pains and fell into fits of wailing and crying in unison. The minister concluded that the family's washerwoman had demonic powers and was torturing the children.
Today we have advanced methods for determining mental illness that were not known in the late sixteen hundreds. Massachusetts Puritans considered impure thoughts and actions responsible for any behavior that did not coincide with their beliefs. They lost all tolerance for individual expression and were quick to judge.
The Salem trials accused many individuals, mostly women, of witchcraft for a number of reasons. There were local grudges involved in some cases, family feuds in others, and some simply wanted to purge their villages of what they deemed loose, or immoral individuals. It was also an explanation for the plague of smallpox that affected the region during this time.
Household pets, especially cats, became known as familiars if it was believed their owners had turned them into accomplices. Hundreds of animals were put to death for this reason. Any kind of skin blemish could cause the villagers to accuse individuals of being possessed. They could be arrested and searched for something as common as freckles.
At the end of these trials, a total of twenty people were either hanged or stoned to death. Most of these were women. Some who escaped the death penalty died in prison while others were pardoned or escaped. George Burroughs, an ex-minister and one of those convicted, stunned the villagers who had come to see him hang when he recited the entire Lord's Prayer on the scaffolding. A witch would have been unable to do that, but against the pleas of the crowd, Mather urged the authorities to complete the sentence.
After the trials, when some women recanted their confessions, Mather came to doubt his previous convictions and attempted to minimize them in later published works. History however remembers this man for the flames of intolerance he fanned.
Unfortunately today we live in a country where some people mistrust and fear individuals because they worship differently or look a certain way. Some want them deported or forced into confined and patrolled areas. These ideas are just as dangerous today as they were three hundred years ago.
Mather did many fine things during his lifetime and was a prodigious writer. One of his works, "Memorable Providences", recounts a defining moment in his religious life. He was apparently called upon by a mason to evaluate the disturbing behavior of that person's children. They were experiencing terrible aches and pains and fell into fits of wailing and crying in unison. The minister concluded that the family's washerwoman had demonic powers and was torturing the children.
Today we have advanced methods for determining mental illness that were not known in the late sixteen hundreds. Massachusetts Puritans considered impure thoughts and actions responsible for any behavior that did not coincide with their beliefs. They lost all tolerance for individual expression and were quick to judge.
The Salem trials accused many individuals, mostly women, of witchcraft for a number of reasons. There were local grudges involved in some cases, family feuds in others, and some simply wanted to purge their villages of what they deemed loose, or immoral individuals. It was also an explanation for the plague of smallpox that affected the region during this time.
Household pets, especially cats, became known as familiars if it was believed their owners had turned them into accomplices. Hundreds of animals were put to death for this reason. Any kind of skin blemish could cause the villagers to accuse individuals of being possessed. They could be arrested and searched for something as common as freckles.
At the end of these trials, a total of twenty people were either hanged or stoned to death. Most of these were women. Some who escaped the death penalty died in prison while others were pardoned or escaped. George Burroughs, an ex-minister and one of those convicted, stunned the villagers who had come to see him hang when he recited the entire Lord's Prayer on the scaffolding. A witch would have been unable to do that, but against the pleas of the crowd, Mather urged the authorities to complete the sentence.
After the trials, when some women recanted their confessions, Mather came to doubt his previous convictions and attempted to minimize them in later published works. History however remembers this man for the flames of intolerance he fanned.
Unfortunately today we live in a country where some people mistrust and fear individuals because they worship differently or look a certain way. Some want them deported or forced into confined and patrolled areas. These ideas are just as dangerous today as they were three hundred years ago.
About the Author:
When you are looking for information about Cotton Mather, pay a visit to our web pages online here. Additional details are available at http://billbenson.net/about.html now.
Aucun commentaire:
Enregistrer un commentaire