Pietas in patriam the life of His Excellency Sir William Phips, Knt. late Captain…

In fine, The last Courts that sate upon this Thorny Business, finding that it was impossible to Penetrate into the whole Meaning of the Things that had happened, and that so many unsearchable Cheats were interwoven into the Conclusion of a Mysterious Business, which perhaps had not crept thereinto at the Beginning of it, they cleared the Accused as fast as they Tried them; and within a little while the Afflicted were most of them delivered out of their Troubles also: And the Land had Peace restored unto it, by the God of Peace, treading Satan under foot. Erasmus, among other Historians, does tell us, that at a Town in Germany, a Daemon appearing on the Top of a Chimney, threatened that he would set the Town on Fire, and at length scattering some Ashes abroad, the whole Town was presently and horribly Burnt unto the Ground.

In fine, The last Courts that sate upon this Thorny Business, finding that it was impossible to Penetrate into the whole Meaning of the Things that had happened, and that so many unsearchable Cheats were enterwoven into the Conclusion of a Mysterious Business, which perhaps had not crept thereinto at the Beginning of it, they cleared the Accused as fast as they Tried them; and within a little while the Afflicted were most of them delivered out of their Troubles also: And the Land had Peace restored unto it, by the God of Peace, treading Satan under foot. Erasmus, among other Historians, does tell us, that at a Town in Germany, a Daemon appearing on the Top of a Chimney, threatned that he would set the Town on Fire, and at length scattering some Ashes abroad, the whole Town was presently and horribly Burnt unto the Ground.

Sir William Phips now beheld such Daemons hideously scattering Fire about the Country, in the Exasperations, which the Minds of Men were on these Things rising unto; and therefore when he had well Canvased a Cause, which perhaps might have puzzled the Wisdom of the Wisest Men on Earth to have managed, without any Error in their Administrations, he thought, if it would be any Error at all, it would certainly be the safest, for him, to put a stop unto all future Prosecutions as far as it lay in him to do it.