Salem Witch Trials Quotes

If American literature has a few heroes, Miller is one of them. He refused to name names at the McCarthy hearings, and his play 'The Crucible' analysed the hearings in the context of a previous American mass psychosis, the Salem witch trials. ~ Jane Smiley

He wondered at the atrocities human kind was capable of committing. The majority of those housed below were ill, mentally or physically, not witches. Most were poor victims
the outcasts of society; or the opposite, people so blessed, others coveted their lives. ~ Brynn Chapman

Your Alex.He's selfish too.He could have left you alone, but he didn't. The difference is he's always known the consequences."
"And what are the consequences? What did you see?"
"You really should learn your history better Rowan." She slid the book across the table to me.
The book was open and her finger was pointed to a list of names. I took a deep breath and began to read aloud.
"A list of the accused witches hung at Gallows Hill." I let my eyes wander down until they froze on one name.
"Alexander William Foster." The words sucked the life from me, leaving me limp and broken. My eyes met hers.
"What does this mean?" She pulled the book back and grabbed my hand.
"It means that Alex is from a very different place. A place where is no free will.When they find out what he is, he'll hang for it, Rowan.And they will find out.It's all here. His future is our history.You can't change that." She tapped on the book as she folded the cover closed. I caught a glimpse of the title. The Salem Witch Trials. ~ Tara A. Fuller

If I do not do this thing, then it may go on and on. Nothing of the greater good comes without struggle and sacrifice in equal measure, be you man or woman, and in this way are we freed from tyranny. ~ Kathleen Kent

Bobby conjured up something that scared him to death and he ran out of the house and never came back. Of course you're supposed to close those doors but they never did… I found these cards dating back to the Salem witch trials that were at a house in New York where we lived with Raven, and they were covered in human blood. They were horrifying. I took about ten of them and they almost destroyed my life…The toilets flushed black and there was infestation of flies. Objects were flying off the counters at us. The house smelled like Rosewater Lavender, which was an old cologne people used in the 1600's. We would tell the spirit to leave but it would go into another room. I was someone who didn't believe in any of this and in two weeks I had to become an expert or it would have killed me and my son. Finally I found out who it was, what it was and I had to return it to Salem. Since then it has been a process of getting rid of the residual effects. I had an exorcism done several times….I am a very religious person because of it today. I won't go into it any further but I will say that Cliff Burton of Metallica had the other half of the artifacts that I had and I really believe they killed him ~ Jon Wiederhorn

The Lord works in mysterious ways. What's true to one man, a wonder and a marvel, might not seem so to another, as God didn't intend it for him. ~ Katherine Howe

Sometime the witch hunting takes on atrocious dimensions - the Nazi persecution of Jews, the Salem witch trials, the Ku Klux Klan scapegoating of blacks. Notice, however, that in all such cases the persecutor hates the persecuted for precisely those traits that the persecutor displays with a glaringly uncivilized fury. At other times, the witch hunt appears in less terrifying proportions - the cold war fear of a "Commie under every bed," for instance. And often, it appears in comic form - the interminable gossip about everybody else that tells you much more about the gossiper than about the object of gossip. But all of these are instances of individuals desperate to prove that their own shadows belong to other people.

Many men and women will launch into tirades about how disgusting homosexuals are. Despite how decent and rational they otherwise try to behave, they find themselves seized with a loathing of any homosexual, and in an emotional outrage will advocate such things as suspending gay civil rights (or worse). But why does such an individual hate homosexuals so passionately? Oddly, he doesn't hate the homosexual because he is homosexual; he hates him because he sees in the homosexual what he secretly fears he himself might become. He is most uncomfortable with his own natural, unavoidable, but minor homosexual tendencies, and so projects them. He thus comes to hate the homosexual inclinations in other people - but only because he first hates them in himself ~ Ken Wilber

The three hundredth anniversary of the Salem witch trials of 1692 comes at a time when witchcraft commands a scholarly attention that would have been puzzling in 1892 or even in 1792. ~ Edmund Morgan

He have his goodness now. God forbid I take it from him! ~ Arthur Miller

My next book is on the Salem witch trials. As a small-town Massachusetts girl, this makes me very happy. So does the reunion with documents! ~ Stacy Schiff

- L, did you know we're reenacting the Salem witch trials in English
tomorrow?
- Haven't been memorizing your case file? Do you even look in your
backpack anymore?
- Did you know my dad is videotaping it? I do. Because I walked in on his lunch date with Mrs. English.
- Ewww.
- What should we do?
- I guess we should start calling her Ms. English?
- Not funny, L. ~ Kami Garcia

Without really analyzing it, I grew up in Massachusetts, so the Salem witch trials were always something that I was around. The average kindergartner probably doesn't know about it, except that in Massachusetts, you do, because they'll take you on field trips to see reenactments and stuff. ~ Rob Zombie

The Salem [witch] trials…can be seen as an example of the propensity of the American people to be convulsed by spasms of self-righteous rage against enemies, real or imaginary, of their society and way of living. Hence the parallels later drawn between Salem in 1692 and the "Red Scare" of 1919-20, Senator McCarthy's hunt for Communists in the early 1950's, the Watergate hysteria of 1973-74, and the Irangate hunt of the 1980s. What strikes the historian, however, is not just the intensity of the self-delusion in the summer of 1692, by no means unusual for the age, but the speed of the recovery from it in the autumn, and the anxiety of the local government and society to confess wrongdoing, to make reparation and search for the truth. That indeed is uncommon in any age. In the late 17th century it was perhaps more remarkable than the hysteria itself and a good augury for America's future as a humane and truth-seeking commonwealth. The rule of law did indeed break down, but it was restored with promptness and penitence. ~ Paul Johnson

There is a certain irony here, because many of the first werewolves to be outed in society from the 16th through the 18th centuries were actually women. Just as our American ancestors had their Salem Witch Trials, Europe had its Werewolf Trials, and a large number of the so-called "werewolves" tortured and burned at the stake were female. […] In the 17th-century werewolf trials of Estonia, women were about 150 percent more likely to be accused of lycanthropy; however, they were about 100 percent less likely to be remembered for it."

"Here's also a pronounced lack of female werewolves in popular culture. Their near absence in literature and film is explained away by various fancies: they're sterile, an aberration, or - most galling of all - they don't even exist.Their omission from popular culture does one thing very effectively: It prevents us, and men especially, from being confronted by hairy, ugly, uncontrollable women. Shapeshifting women in fantasy stories tend to transform into animals that we consider feminine, such as cats or birds, which are pretty and dainty, and occasionally slick and wicked serpents. But because the werewolf represents traits that are accepted as masculine - strength, large size, violence, and hirsutism - we tend to think of the werewolf as being naturally male. The female werewolf is disturbing because she entirely breaks the rules of femininity. ~ Julia Oldham

He peered into the night-dark windows of the afflicted girls, whispering names and stirring fits into their dreams until their own screams awakened them. The girls concocted fantastic stories of witches and curses and torture at the hands of specters. More accusers joined their ranks without his nurturing, puppets of their own envy. Such imagination, such dedication to the destruction of their own. And all in his name. It touched his dark soul. ~ Susan Catalano

This is outrageous and demonstrates the danger of permitting religion in the public square," Liebowitz said. "History teaches us, or should have by now, that wars caused by religion, and especially Christianity, have killed more people than all other causes, combined."

"I'm afraid that's not accurate. Stalin, Mao and Pol Pot each killed millions and they were all confirmed atheists," Cardinal Guzetti replied. "Remember the Great Peoples Cultural Revolution? Over twenty million died before it was over. The killing fields in Cambodia claimed the lives of unknown millions, but some estimates suggest twenty five percent of the country's population died at the hands of the Camere Rouge. Joseph Stalin starved ten to twelve million Russian peasant farmers to death and killed another two million building the great Canal outside of Moscow. All three of these monsters were confirmed atheists . . . Probably five thousand people were killed during the Inquisition. In America, thirteen were put on trial during the Salem witch trials. Horrible and indefensible, no doubt. But millions of human beings were slaughtered by Stalin, Pol Pot and Mao. I'm afraid we Christians are amateurs compared to you atheists. ~ Joseph Max Lewis

When change cometh, she will bring peace at her back. She will not bend to your will; you must bend to heres. ~ Adriana Mather

At the word witch, we imagine the horrible old crones from Macbeth. But the cruel trials witches suffered teach us the opposite. Many perished precisely because they were young and beautiful. ~ Andre Breton

You're so seventeenth century. ~ Susan Catalano

Everyone needs to calm down! Okay, you got a weird cookie. So what? I don't mean to swat your ego here, buddy, but this smacks a little narcissistic for me. God is not trying to communicate to you through a cookie. It doesn't work that way. God's not all Jack-and-the-magic-beans and tooth-beneath-the pillow voodoo. You don't just close your eyes, flap open your Bible, and slam a steak knife into a verse. It's that sort of thinking that leads to witch trials and Senate probes. ~ Geoffrey Wood

they tremble and hide under the table when a local branch of ADL calls them 'anti-Semites'. Like the label of 'witch' in Salem, this word triggers a spasm wave in the target population. ~ Israel Shamir

61 lynchings occurred in 1920 alone. In 1921, 62, some of the victims, soldiers returning from the Great War who after fighting and winning significant victories - just as they had fought in the Revolutionary and Civil wars and the wars again the Indians - thought that America would repay them for the generosity of putting their lives on the line, for aiding in salvaging their hides from the Kaiser who had been tagged "enemy" this time. Instead, a Protestant country ignorant even of Western mysteries executes soldiers after a manner of punishments dealt to witches in the "Middle Ages." Europe and the Catholic Church are horrified but not surprised at this "tough guy" across the waters whose horrendous murders in Salem led Europe to reform its "witch laws. ~ Ishmael Reed

Brought before HCUA, Miller was chastised for the suggestion that Congressional investigations might have something in common with witch trials; he replied, "The comparison is inevitable, sir." Thomas was shortly afterwards thrown in jail for fraud. ~ Carl Sagan

When the hysteria of a witch-hunt is granted supremacy over the logic, values and spirit of the law, justice can only become a warped, alien concept in that society. ~ Stewart Stafford

There is darkness inside all of us, though mine is more dangerous than most. Still, we all have it - that part of our soul that is irreparably damaged by the very trials and tribulations of life. We are what we are because of it, or perhaps in spite of it. Some use
it as a shield to hide behind, others as an excuse to do unconscionable things. But, truly, the darkness is simply a piece of the whole, neither good nor evil unless you make it so. It
took a witch, a war, and a voodoo queen to teach me that. ~ Jenna Maclaine

[Dan] Brown states that five million women were killed by the Church as witches. In fact, modern research has shown that the witch hunts began in the sixteenth century in Europe and that between 30,000 and 50,000 men and women were burned to death for the crime of witchcraft. However, 90 per cent of those trials took place before secular tribunals in countries such as Germany and France where by the 1500s the Church had lost most of its influence in judicial matters. Indeed, it was precisely in countries like Spain and Italy where the Catholic Church still had influence that there were almost no witchcraft trials. ~ Michael Coren

WEST SALEM ~ October 2011
A sudden vision, fraught with malevolence and darkness, obscured her sight. The face of a menacing figure turned from the shadows of his grisly handiwork and stared at Sorcha.
Her muscles tensed. By the Goddess, could he see her?
Please! No!
She wanted to scream, to run, but the vision ensnared her into the horrific moment like a fly in a spider's web. ~ Cherie De Sues

You see, a witch has to have a familiar, some little animal like a cat or a toad. He helps her somehow. When the witch dies the familiar is suppose to die too, but sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes, if it's absorbed enough magic, it lives on. Maybe this toad found its way south from Salem, from the days when Cotton Mather was hanging witches. Or maybe Lafitte had a Creole girl who called on the Black Man in the pirate-haven of Barataria. The Gulf is full of ghosts and memories, and one of those ghosts might very well be that of a woman with warlock blood who'd come from Europe a long time ago, and died on the new continent.
And possibly her familiar didn't know the way home. There's not much room for magic in America now, but once there was room.
("Before I Wake ... ") ~ Henry Kuttner

I always say that no matter what the torture is, or the tool is, first of all it's nothing worse than what's been done already and that wasn't done by the church and the state for over a period of 250 years during the European witch trials. ~ Eli Roth

Redheads were particularly persecuted during the European witch trials of the fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The colour was associated with the devil, and the pale skin which most redheads have was thought unnatural and deathly. ~ Kate Williams

There are freaky talking mannequins in the Salem Witch Museum that recite the Lord's Prayer and while they do resemble shrunken apples they nevertheless help the visitor understand how hard it must have been for the condemned to say the line about forgiving those who trespass against us. ~ Sarah Vowell

Throughout these centuries, those who should, by their birth, training, and position, have been the conscience of the world, accepted the delusion and promoted it. Such men not only appealed to the emotions of religion, but perverted the entire structure of logic and reason. Everything was sacrificed to a preconceived prejudice. The logic of the Demonologists, all highly educated men, leaders in their own disciplines, is the most terrifying feature of witchcraft. Because of their turning rational thinking on its head--far more than the most foul act of a torturer or witch judge--the centuries of the witchcraft mania may be called the centuries of uncivilization. ~ Rossell Hope Robbins

On most things except witch trials, Virginia will always have been first. ~ Morgan Griffith

the Jews should stay away from this trial -- for their own sake. For -- mark this well -- the charge "a war for the Jews" is still being made, and in the post-war years it will be made again and again. The too-large percentage of Jewish men and women here will be cited as proof of this charge. Sometimes it seems that the Jews will never learn about these things. They seem intent on bringing new difficulties down on their own heads. I do not like to write about this matter... but I am disturbed about it. They are pushing and crowding and competing with each other, and with everyone else. They will try the case I guess...

--Letters from Nuremberg, page 135 ~ Christopher J. Dodd

And then I recalled those mysterious stories about the waxworkers of the middle ages and the public reprobation attached to their trade. Did they not live in cellars, in the eternal twilight propitious for enchantments and apparitions? Their visionary art (who, more than they, evoked a truer image of life?) was closely related to that of magicians: bewitchments were carried out with wax figures, witch trials are full of them, and one particular legend haunted me above all, that of the modeler from Anspach, who slowly squeezed the soul and the life out of his model in order to animate his painted waxwork and then, having finished his work of art, awaited nightfall to go and bury the corpse in the ditch at the city walls. ~ Jean Lorrain

Merry's mind devolved into chaos. Ideas evaded her. Words chased one another into meaningless jumbles. Her breath came in shallow gasps as the ghastly image of William's lifeless body twisting in the wind, solidified and held. ~ Susan Catalano

Wounds that haven't healed properly still hurt you. You pretend to allow them faze you, but I see past the mask. Shame, that a pretty woman like you has to perish by fire." Cain shrugged. "I'm surprised they didn't burn you in the witch trials." He shook his head as if he corrected himself. "No, what am I saying? You were with Saain during that time. ~ Millicent Ashby

Salem has become this ... Mecca for Wiccans, but no witches died here. Aside from Tituba, no one practiced anything like witchcraft near here in colonial times. It was a bunch of bored Puritans who thought killing their neighbors at the behest of teenage girls was a fine, Christian form of entertainment and land acquisition. ~ Thomm Quackenbush

This mundus tenebrosus, this shaddowy world of Mankind, is sunk into Night; there is not a Field without its Spirits, nor a City without its Daemons, and the Lunaticks speak Prophesies while the Wise men fall into the Pitte. We are all in the Dark, one with another. And, as the Inke stains the Paper on which it is spilt and slowly spreads to Blot out the Characters, so the Contagion of darkness and malefaction grows apace until all becomes unrecognizable. Thus it was with the Witches who were tryed by Swimming not long before, since once the Prosecution had commenced no Stop could be put to the raving Women who came forward: the number of Afflicted and Accused began to encrease and, upon Examination, more confess'd themselves guilty of Crimes than were suspected of. And so it went, till the Evil revealed was so great that it threatened to bring all into Confusion.

And yet in the way of that Philosophie much cryed up in London and elsewhere, there are those like Sir Chris. who speak only of what is Rational and what is Demonstrated, of Propriety and Plainness. Religion Not Mysterious is their Motto, but if they would wish the Godhead to be Reasonable why was it that when Adam heard that Voice in the Garden he was afraid unto Death? The Mysteries must become easy and familiar, it is said, and it has now reached such a Pitch that there are those who wish to bring their mathematicall Calculations into Morality, viz. the Quantity of Publick Good produced by any Agent is ~ Peter Ackroyd

The archetype of the witch is long overdue for celebration. Daughters, mothers, queens, virgins, wives, et al. derive meaning from their relation to another person. Witches, on the other hand, have power on their own terms. They have agency. They create. They praise. They commune with nature/ Spirit/God/dess/Choose-your-own-semantics, freely, and free of any mediator. But most importantly: they make things happen. The best definition of magic I've been able to come up with is "symbolic action with intent" - "action" being the operative word. Witches are midwives to metamorphosis. They are magical women, and they, quite literally, change the world. ~ Pamela J. Grossman

This book is a fairy tale in which I am the prince and the princess. I am the king and the queen. I am my own wicked witch and fairy godmother. This book is a fairy tale in which I'm cursed and blessed by others. But, finally, I am the fair y finding my own magic. ~ Dean Atta

Do you somehow think that terrorizing a middle schooler is going to give you some street cred? It's just going to make you look like a witch," he said. "Or even more of a witch than most people already think you are. ~ Lily Harper Hart

Despite trials, worldly confusion, and caustic voices, we can trust in the Lord and go forward with happy hearts, knowing that with every challenge or problem, there's the strength to go on. Why? Because we know His promises are real, that He does know us by name and has a plan for each of us. He will help us learn what it is and give us joy in doing it. ~ Elaine L. Jack

I suppose he is asleep?" said Ron quietly as the witch slid the compartment door closed. "I mean - he hasn't died, has he?" "No, no, he's breathing," whispered Hermione ~ J.K. Rowling

Don't think to come over me with th' old tale, that the rich know nothing of the trials of the poor; I say, if they don't know, they ought to know. ~ Elizabeth Gaskell

The United States and the European Union do want to have a rule of law, and that rule of law should be for a fair trial. And that fair trial needs to have an impartial jury. ~ Maria Cantwell

A president is a high-level official who is elected to carry out a function. He is not a king, not a god. He is not the witch doctor of a tribe who knows everything. He is a civil servant. I think the ideal way of living is to live like the vast majority of people whom we attempt to serve and represent. ~ Jose Mujica

My mother was a pathetic patchwork witch who had used magic so much to meddle in her own life that she had no integrity left and was nothing but a coil of hatreds consuming themselves in futility. We had already hedged her power, with the help of the fairies. ~ Jo Walton

You are not alone, he said, in a voice no one but she could hear. Remember. ~ Katherine Arden

And yet, there was a witch. There is always a witch. ~ E. Lockhart

The cold, and even the hunger, the watchings and sleeplessness of nights of danger, and the feeling at times of utter isolation and helplessness, were well and wisely chosen, and tenderly and lovingly meted out. What circumstances could have rendered the Word of God more sweet, the presence of God more real, the help of God more precious? ~ Hudson Taylor

An incompetent lawyer can delay a trial for months or years. A competent lawyer can delay one even longer. ~ Evelle J. Younger

Even a witch wants sympathy. ~ Franny Billingsley

Why, since man and woman were created for each other, had He made their desires so dissimilar? Why should one class of women be able to dwell in luxurious seclusion from the trials of life, while another class performed their loathsome tasks? Surely His wisdom had not decreed that one set of women should live in degradation and in the end should perish that others might live in security, preserve their frappeed chastity, and in the end be saved. ~ Madeleine Albright

At that instant the hag's noisy breathing stopped and with it all other sound. Her eyes opened, showing only whites - milky ovals infinitely eerie in the dark root-tangle of her sharp features and stringy hair. The gray tip of her tongue traveled like a large maggot around her lips. ~ Fritz Leiber