upon the Town, where the first Church of our Lord in this Colony was gathered, producing those distractions, which have almost ruin'd the Town.[118] We have seen likewise the _Plague_ reaching afterwards into other Towns far and near, where the Houses of good Men have the Devils filling of them with terrible Vexations! This is the Descent, which, it seems, the Devil has now made upon us. But that which makes this Descent the more formidable, is; the _multitude_ and _quality_ of Persons accused of an interest in this _Witchcraft_, by the Efficacy of the _Spectres_ which take their Name and shape upon them; causing very many good and wise Men to fear, [43] That many _innocent_, yea, and some _vertuous_ persons, are by the Devils in this matter, imposed upon; That the Devils have obtain'd the power, to take on them the likeness of harmless people, and in that likeness afflict other people, and be so abused by Præstigious _Dæmons_, that upon their look or touch, the afflicted shall be oddly affected. Arguments from the _Providence of God_, on the one side, and from our _Charity_ towards _Man_ on the other side, have made this now to become a most agitated Controversie among us. There is an _Agony_ produced in the Minds of Men, lest the Devil should sham us with _Devices_, of perhaps a finer Thred, than was ever yet practised upon the World. The whole business is become hereupon so _Snarled_, and the determination of the Question one way or another, so _dismal_, that our Honourable Judges have a Room for _Jehoshaphat's_ Exclamation, _We know not what to do!_[119] They have used, as Judges have heretofore done, the _Spectral Evidences_, to introduce their further Enquiries into the _Lives_ of the persons accused; and they have thereupon, by the wonderful Providence of God, been so strengthened with _other evidences_, that some of the _Witch Gang_ have been fairly Executed. But what shall be done, as to those against whom the _evidence_ is chiefly founded in the _dark world?_ Here they do solemnly demand our Addresses to the _Father of Lights_, on their behalf. But in the mean time, the Devil improves the _Darkness_ of this Affair, to push us into a _Blind Mans Buffet_, and we are even ready to be _sinfully_, yea, hotly, and madly, mauling one another in the _dark_.[120] The consequence of these things, every _considerate_ Man trembles at; and the more, because the frequent cheats of Passion, and Rumour, do precipitate so many, that I wish I could say, The most were _considerate_.