Joseph Glanvill

(1636 - 1680)

The son of a Puritan merchant, Joseph Glanvill was ordained in 1660 by the restored Church of England and began a twenty-year career as a clergyman, writing treatises in favor of the scientific method as a means to reveal the workings of God. His posthumously published work on witchcraft, Saducismus Triumphatus, influenced Cotton Mather and was quoted by Shirley Jackson in The Lottery and Other Stories.