Cambridge Association
Rev. Wigglesworth was among the area ministers invited to join the Cambridge Association when it formed in 1690, organized by the twenty-seven-year-old Rev.Cotton Mather and the elder Rev.Charles Morton. The first order of business was to respond to a letter from the minister at Salem Village, Rev.Samuel Parris, and invite him to come down to meet with them a week later in the college library in Cambridge (see photo).
When they joined, ministers signed the book.During the witchcraft trials in 1692, this group of ministers met often in the library and were solicited for advice regarding witchcraft doctrine.[8] Wigglesworth was in attendance at a number of meetings that year but is not recorded as having had much to say. His famous poem "Day of Doom" published some 30 years prior has only one brief mention of the word "witch."[9] Unlike the Mathers, witchcraft does not appear to have been a subject of great interest to him.
On October 3, 1692, Wigglesworth signed his name to Rev. Samuel Willard's short and forceful introduction ("It is therefore exceeding necessary that in such a day as this, men be informed what is evidence and what is not.") of Increase Mather's essay "Cases Concerning Evil Spirits." Increase Mather himself does not appear to have been in attendance at this meeting and his son Cotton Mather famously refused to sign Willard's introduction.[10][11]
After the trials were ended, churchmembers in Salem Village who had suffered, or lost loved ones, sought a Church Council to hear grievances against their pastor Parris and they were supported in this effort by Willard.[12] Parris stalled for as long as he could and then sought allies, writing to the Mathers, and also inviting Wigglesworth through his church at Malden.[13] It is unclear why Parris would have considered Wigglesworth a possible ally. In any event, Wigglesworth did not attend the Council which took place April 3, 1695.[14]
To Leave My Testimony
Finally, feeling that he was near the end of his life, on July 22, 1704, Wigglesworth was compelled "to leave my testimony before I leave the world" and he wrote a passionate letter to Increase Mather which directly addresses the minister's culpability in the events of 1692:
Rev. and Dear Sir, I am right well assured that both yourself, your son, and the rest of our brethren with you in Boston, have a deep sense upon your spirits of the awful symptoms of the Divine displeasure that we lie under at this day...give me leave to impart some of my serious and solemn thoughts. I fear (amongst our many other provocations) that God hath a controversy with us about what was done in the time of the Witchcraft. I fear that innocent blood hath been shed, and that many have had their hands defiled therewith... Paul, a Pharisee, persecuted the Church of God, shed the blood of God's Saints, and yet obtained mercy, because he did it in ignorance; but how doth he bewail it, and shame himself for it, before God and men afterwards. I think, and am verily persuaded, God expects that we do the like, in order to our obtaining his pardon: I mean by a Public and Solemn acknowledgment of it and humiliation for it [emphasis added]; and the more particularly and personally it is done by all that have been actors, the more pleasing it will be to God... the whole country lies under a curse... til some effectual course is taken by our honored Governor and General Court to make amends and reparation [to the families of those condemned] for supposed witchcraft [and those] ruined by taking away and making havoc of their estates... I have with a weak body and trembling hand, endeavored to leave my testimony before I leave the world. [15]
Wigglesworth also went a step further in exhorting Increase Mather to express a statement of contrition "to the Rev. Samuel Willard." Increase Mather had lost the presidency of the college to Willard in 1701 and retained a great bitterness about it at this time.[16]
The Mathers' Oblique Response
There seems to be no record of a direct response from the Mathers, but judging from their past reactions (see controversy over formation of Brattle Square church, etc) it is unlikely they would have taken Wigglesworth's criticisms lightly. Wigglesworth had been astute in believing the end of his life was near and he passed away within a year (June 10, 1705) of writing the letter. The Mathers quickly began to assert themselves relative to their fellow pastor's posthumous legacy. Cotton Mather gained access to his diary and private papers and quoted from them in a sermon preached at Malden on June 24, 1705. The Mathers had this sermon printed in Boston and a copy was signed by Increase Mather and sent to the church at Malden.[17][18]
