The Salem trials came on just as the European witch craze was winding down. Many practicing Christians believed that the devil could give powers to people called witches in return for their loyalty. Cotton Mather was an influential New England Puritan minister and prolific author, both socially and politically. In his early life he was a strong believer in witchcraft. One of his most famous works, "Memorable Providences, Relating to Witchcrafts and Possessions", played an important role in causing the witch trials. It was "A faithful account of many wonderful and surprising things, that have befallen several bewitched and possessed persons in New England. Particularly, a narrative of the marvellous trouble and releef experienced by a pious family in Boston, very lately and sadly molested with evil spirits." (Mather 1) Mather goes on to describe a family who became possessed by the devil and began having fits and exhibiting other bewitched traits. It was this book that sat on the shelf of Samuel Parris when in 1692, his daughter, Elizabeth Parris, niece Abigail Williams, and also another girl, Ann Putnam, started having fits. They screamed , threw things, uttered peculiar sounds, and contorted themselves into strange positions. The doctor blamed the supernatural. The girls blamed Tituba the Parris family's slave for their pain. And thus the Witch trials began. (Blumberg)