Also her statement is very distinct, that whatever she did in that respect was done, so far as she was concerned, both “ignorantly and unwittingly.” We are aware that those two words are sometimes used synonymously, or very nearly so. But when the first occurs in a carefully constructed sentence, the other, if added, should be deemed to have been inserted for the special purpose of expressing something beyond what the first usually imports. The whole had not been told when she had said she acted ignorantly. To express the remainder, she added—unwittingly. When that word was thus applied, she cannot fairly be supposed to have meant less than that she acted unknowingly—that is, without either knowledge or consciousness that she did thus act. An unwitting instrument—an instrument not knowing that it was being used—enfolds within itself a silent but most potent plea for the world’s lenient regards. When consciousness has taken no cognizance of acts performed by the tongue or the hand,—when memory can find no record of them, compunction cannot gnaw deeply, nor conscience be a stern accuser. Often conscience may be at peace, and God may approve, where man blames. Testimony from without may force mental conviction that one’s lips and limbs must have been used in doing excessive harm, though consciousness of the fact be entirely wanting. Conviction even thus generated will naturally and almost necessarily create apprehension that the world is regarding the owner of those lips and limbs as having been guilty of very great crimes. That apprehension may create sadness over all one’s subsequent days. Public opinion bridles the tongue then; for a denial of guilt, however honest and true, can receive no credence where external senses have perceived knowledge to the contrary. Ann’s relations to society may necessarily have been saddening during many years, even though she of herself had done nothing offensive either to her own conscience or to God.
Imagination can scarcely picture the sadness which must have come upon the accusing girls when, a year or two later, public opinion and favor, which at first buoyed them up and favored such use of their organisms as has been depicted, began to turn against them and to brand them as murderers of the innocent and good. We have no means to trace many of them through their subsequent years. Could we do it, we should expect to find them weighed down, depressed, and made forlorn by the great change of estimation in which the doings were afterward held, in which they had appeared to be prominent and most disastrous actors. Few of them probably had inherent stamina enough to enable them to stand erect, and move about firmly poised, under the burdens of obloquy, pity, hatred, resentment, &c., which the wounded hearts of the families of murdered ones would lay upon these seeming authors of their losses.
It is pleasant to find that the sensitive and bright Ann Putnam, as prominent as any one in the band of accusers, survived such pressure, continued long to care for her orphaned little brothers and sisters, and, after the first and most crushing effects of the change in public opinion had been endured for a dozen years or more, held out her hand in friendly beckoning to those who had most seeming cause to blame her, and who perhaps in turn had imposed her heaviest burdens, and seeking to thus open the way for her unopposed admission to the church, and to fellowship with the kindred and friends of those whom her tongue had been used to defame and bring to ignominious death. Her life experiences were hard, but perhaps fruitful of good to man beyond what words can express. Possibly it is her blessed privilege now to see that her form was used as an instrument for effecting Christendom’s emancipation from monstrous error, and putting an effectual stop to executions for witchcraft everywhere.
The Prosecutors.
The first warrants for arrest for witchcraft at Salem were issued on February 29, 1692, on complaint preferred by Joseph Hutchinson, Thomas Putnam, Edward Putnam, and Thomas Preston, that Sarah Good, Sarah Osburn, and Tituba had by witchcraft, within the last two months, done harm to Elizabeth Parris, Abigail Williams, Anne Putnam, and Elizabeth Hubbard.
Complaint of Martha Corey was made by Edward Putnam and Henry Keney, March 19.
Edward Putnam and Jonathan Putnam complained of Rebecca Nurse; and
Jonathan Walcott and Nathaniel Ingersoll, against Elizabeth Proctor.