=83. The Persecution of the Witches.=—Owing to political disturbances, fear of Indians, and the ravages of smallpox epidemics, the inhabitants of Massachusetts, near the end of the seventeenth century, were seized with great despondency. In common with many persons in England and in Germany they believed that the Scriptural injunction, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live,” was binding upon a modern Christian community. Under the impulse of this belief they began a persecution of many citizens, chiefly old women, for the supposed crime of witchcraft. Trials were held, presided over by learned magistrates; the testimony of frightened children was taken; and in Salem (1692) nineteen persons were hanged, and one pressed to death. Hundreds of others were arrested on suspicion, and for a time the colony seemed completely to have lost its reason. Even such a distinguished scholar and minister as Cotton Mather[43] shared in the frenzy and defended it. But Judge Samuel Sewall (now known for a famous diary descriptive of the life of the period) made a public recantation in church of his share in the frightful business. It was indeed a terrible time, but New England emerged from it safely, and could point in extenuation to many similar outbreaks of popular frenzy in the Old World. =84. Literature.=—It has been held, with much show of truth, that only a people, gifted with imagination could have been stirred into such a frenzied state of mind as characterized the New Englanders during the persecution of the witches. Unfortunately, their imaginative powers were employed too exclusively upon religious and theological themes, with the result that although much was written in New England during the seventeenth century, little truly imaginative literature was produced. Drama and fiction were non-existent, and the verse written hardly rose to the dignity of poetry. Mrs. Anne Bradstreet (1613–1672) and the Rev. Michael Wigglesworth (1631–1705, author of a quaint, grewsome poem entitled _The Day of Doom_) are almost the only poets worthy of mention, and their works are unread to-day. There were, on the other hand, many learned divines, like Thomas Hooker (1586–1647), John Cotton (1585–1652), Roger Williams (1607–1684), and Increase Mather (1639–1723), whose sermons and religious tracts were widely read by their contemporaries; but oblivion has fallen upon them also, save perhaps in the case of Williams. Next in importance to theology stood history, and among the historians the chief place must be given to Governors William Bradford and John Winthrop, who wrote the early annals of their respective colonies of Plymouth and Massachusetts Bay. But probably the most able and distinguished writer produced in America during the seventeenth century was the celebrated divine already mentioned, Cotton Mather (1663–1728), who was, as scholar, theologian, and historian, an epitome of the learning of the age. His best-known