“A PEOPLE OF GOD SETTLED IN THOSE WHICH WERE ONCE THE DEVIL’S TERRITORIES”: COTTON MATHER’S IMPORTANT ACCOUNT OF THE SALEM WITCH TRIALS, WONDERS OF THE INVISIBLE WORLD, 1693

MATHER, Cotton. Wonders of the Invisible World: Being an Account of the Tryals of Several Witches Lately Executed in New-England… London: for John Dunton, 1693. Octavo, period-style plain tan wrappers; pp. 60 [of 62]. Housed in a custom chemise and clamshell box.

Scarce second London edition, one of three published within a year of the first, of Mather’s theological interpretation of the Salem witch trials, “the most important of the contemporary narratives.”

“Of all the narratives” of the Salem witch trials, only Cotton Mather’s Wonders of the Invisible World “articulates the official definition” of the proceedings, and is thus “the most important of the contemporary narratives for the historical observer” of them. “In Mather’s rendering, the Salem witchcraft trials become the focal point of a grand cosmic drama. That multitudes of demons should suddenly appear in New England was no ordinary judgment against God’s chosen people. The recent expansion of diabolic activities marked a decisive turning point in world history… The final confrontation between God and Satan was being enacted in the present… The unleashing of the devil in Massachusetts signified less the end of New England than the final salvation of the Puritan mission” (Weisman, 130-31). “There were three editions published in London all bearing the date 1693,” although the first and only complete London edition “was probably published in December 1692, although dated 1693 on the title page” (Church 734). This second London edition presents a text abridged from the first. “The pagination of this edition is very irregular” (Sabin 46605). Wing M1175. Lowndes, 1512. Allibone, 1242. Old, faint ink inscriptions to half title and title page.

Occasional light wear to fore-edges; title pages with expert cleaning and minor paper repairs; expert restoration to corner of [H3], a few letters provided in fasimile, H4 provided in facsimile (containing an afterword describing similar witch trials in Sweden, paraphrasing Anthony Horneck). Elusive in any condition. Scarce and significant.