but great presumptions of the boys being suborned to accuse them
falsely. Therefore it was resolved to separate the boy from his
Father, they having both followed the women up to London, they were
both taken and put into several prisons asunder. Whereupon shortly
after the Boy confessed that he was taught and suborned to devise, and
feign those things against them, and had persevered in that wickedness
by the counsel of his Father, and some others, whom envy, revenge and
hope of gain had prompted on to that devillish design and villany; and
he also confessed, that upon that day when he said that they met at
the aforesaid house or barn, he was that very day a mile off, getting
Plums in his Neighbours Orchard. And that this is a most certain
truth, there are many persons yet living, of sufficient reputation and
integrity, that can avouch and testifie the same; and besides, what I
write is the most of it true, upon my own knowledge, and the whole I
have had from his own mouth."--_Displaying of Witchcraft_, p. 277.]

In Dr. Whitaker's astonishment that Margaret Johnson should make the
confession she appears to have done, in a clear case of imposture, few
of his readers will be disposed to participate, who are at all
conversant with the trials of reputed witches in this country.
Confessions were so common on those occasions, that there is, I
believe, not a single instance of any great number of persons being
convicted of witchcraft at one time, some of whom did not make a
confession of guilt. Nor is there anything extraordinary in that
circumstance, when it is remembered that many of them sincerely
believed in the existence of the powers attributed to them; and
others, aged and of weak understanding, were, in a measure, coerced by
the strong persuasion of their guilt, which all around them
manifested, into an acquiescence in the truth of the accusation. In
many cases the confessions were made in the hope, and no doubt with
the promise, seldom performed, that a respite from punishment would be
eventually granted. In other instances, there is as little doubt, that
they were the final results of irritation, agony, and despair.[61] The
confessions are generally composed of "such stuff as dreams are made
of," and what they report to have occurred, might either proceed, when
there was no intention to fabricate, from intertwining the fantastic
threads which sometimes stream upon the waking senses from the land of
shadows, or be c